Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7czq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T09:04:29.976Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

The 1978 Italian Mental Health Law – A Personal Evaluation: A Review

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Kathleen Jones
Affiliation:
Emeritus Professor of Social Policy, University of York, Heslington, York YO1 5DD
Greg Wilkinson
Affiliation:
Subdepartment of Psychological Medicine in North Wales, University of Wales College of Medicine, North Wales Hospital, Denbigh, Clwyd LL16 5SS
T. K. J. Craig
Affiliation:
United Medical and Dental Schools (St Thomas Hospital), Lambeth Palace Road, London SE1 7EH

Abstract

“The author discusses the sociopsychiatric consequences of the 1978 Italian mental health law. He also reviews the international scientific ideas that led up to it. The sociopolitical psychiatric views of the late Franco Basaglia, pioneer of the change in the mental health system of the Italian Republic, are described. Statistical reports and critical analyses are reported. Objective data, based on the author's personal experience as a practising psychiatrist in Rome, Italy, from 1969 to 1987, are given.”

Type
The Current Literature
Copyright
Copyright © 1991 The Royal College of Psychiatrists 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Barzini, L. (1983) The Europeans. New York: Simon & Schuster.Google Scholar
Becker, T. (1985) Psychiatric reform in Italy — how does it work in Piedmont? British Journal of Psychiatry, 147, 254260.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bollini, P., Muscettola, G., Piazza, A., et al (1986) Mental health care in Southern Italy: application of case-control methodology for the evaluation of the impact of the 1978 psychiatric reform. Psychological Medicine, 16, 701707.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bollini, P., Reich, M. & Muscettola, G. (1988) Revision of the Italian psychiatric reform: north/south differences and future strategies. Social Science and Medicine, 27, 13271335.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bollini, P. & Mollica, R. F. (1989) Surviving without the asylum. An overview of the studies on the Italian reform movement. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 177, 607615.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Calabrese, L. V., Micciolo, R. & Tansella, M. (1990) Patterns of care for chronic patients after the Italian psychiatric reform. A longitudinal case register study. Social Science and Medicine, 31, 815822.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Crepet, P. (1990) A transition period in psychiatric care in Italy ten years after the reform. British Journal of Psychiatry, 156, 2736.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Economist (1990) A survey of Italy: awaiting an alternative. Economist, 26 May—1 June.Google Scholar
Freeman, H. L., Fryers, T. & Henderson, J. H. (1985) Mental Health Services in Europe: 10 Years On. Public Health in Europe 25. Copenhagen: World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe.Google Scholar
Glick, I. D. (1990) Improving treatment for the severely mentally ill: implications of the decade-long Italian psychiatric reform. Psychiatry, 53, 316323.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Jones, K. & Poletti, A. (1986) The Italian experience in mental health care. Hospital and Community Psychiatry, 37, 795802.Google ScholarPubMed
Lovell, A. M. (1986) The paradoxes of reform: re-evaluating Italy's mental health law of 1978. Hospital and Community Psychiatry, 37, 802808.Google Scholar
Palermo, G. B. (1991) The 1978 Italian mental health law — a personal evaluation: a review. Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, 84, 99102.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Papeschi, R. (1985) The denial of the institution. A critical review of Franco Basaglia's writings. British Journal of Psychiatry, 146, 247254.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Robb, J. H. (1986) The Italian health services: slow revolution or permanent crisis? Social Science and Medicine, 22, 619627.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sayce, L., Craig, T. K. J. & Boardman, A. P. (1991) Community mental health centres in the UK. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, 26, 1420.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tansella, M. (1991) Community-based psychiatry: long-term patterns of care in south Verona. Psychological Medicine (suppl. 19).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tansella, M., de Salvia, D. & Williams, P. (1987) The Italian psychiatric reform: some quantitative evidence. Social Psychiatry, 22, 3748.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tansella, M. & Williams, P. (1987) The Italian experience and its implications. Psychological Medicine, 17, 283289.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Williams, P., de Salvia, D. & Tansella, M. (1987) Suicide and the Italian psychiatric reform: an appraisal of two data collection systems. European Archives of Psychiatry and Neurological Sciences, 236, 237240.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.