Community Mental Health Services in Italy

Abstract

In 1978, in Italy, approval of Basaglia’s reform law marked a shift from an asylum-based to a community-based mental health system. The main aim of the reform was to treat patients in the community and no longer in psychiatric hospitals. Following the Italian model, similar reforms of mental health care have been approved worldwide. The community-based model aims to promote integration and human rights for people with mental disorders on the basis of their freedom to choose treatment options. By 2000, all psychiatric hospitals had been closed and all patients discharged. Mental health care is organized through the Department of Mental Health, which is the umbrella organization responsible for specialist mental health care in the community; this includes psychiatric wards located in general hospitals, residential facilities, mental health centres, and day-hospital and day-care units. Approval of Law 180 led to a practical and ideological shift in the provision of care to patients with mental disorders. In particular, the reform highlighted the need to treat patients in the same way as any other patient, and mental health care moved from a custodialistic to a therapeutic model. Progressive consolidation of the community-based system of mental health care in Italy has been observed in the past 40 years. However, some reasons for concern still exist, including low staffing levels, potential use of community residential facilities as long-stay residential services, and a heterogeneity in the availability of resources for mental health throughout the country.