Social Psychiatry
The name of this center „Sozialpsychiatrie-Praxis“ refers to the social psychiatry Agreement (Sozialpsychiatrie-Vereinbarung / SPV), which constitutes the legal basis of multimodal therapy for children and adolescents in Germany. The multi-professional work in a child and adolescent psychiatric and child psychologist team has to be under professional medical supervision.
Social Psychiatry agreement is a Germany-wide scheme for children and young people up to 21th birthday. In the adult area there is currently no comparable thing in Germany. The activities of the german psychiatric commission of inquiry in 1984 led to the recommendation to reconcile social psychiatric care contracts. 1989, the statutory mandate to create these structures was given to the health insurance and doctors‘ associations and in 2009 finally the nationwide social psychiatry Agreement (SPV) stepped into force and it shall contribute significantly to supply deficiencies in the child and adolescent psychiatry field by intense and specific outpatient medical treatment options that are less invasive than the more expensive inpatient treatments.
The social psychiatry movement, or community psychiatry movement, was built in the sixties of the twentieth century in parallel with the anti-psychiatry movement as a progressive and humanist-oriented response to the at this time standard rather inhumane treatment of mentally ill or disabled people.
Social Psychiatry provides social causes and relationships with mental disorders in the foreground and preferably operates at an outpatient basis, and thus interacts strongly with the social systems in which a person with mental health problems moves. Medical and constitutional factors are set in relationship with the social function. The core idea of social psychiatry is to prevent hospitalizations and to optimize the therapeutic offers in the outpatient setting. People with mental health problems should not be separated from everyday life, but remain integrated by appropriate treatment and support.
In the medical field of child and adolescent psychiatry and psychotherapy many intersections arise in the operation of the Social Psychiatry agreement with educational areas, such as schools, kindergartens, nurseries, youth welfare institutions and offices. The German Social Code Book 8 says that the profession of child and adolescent psychiatrist has a special role in determining the demand for assistance after § 35a SGB 8 (german social law code). The guiding principle of social psychiatry is in the child and adolescent psychiatric work especially the attempt to identify all social conditions that are relatet to a mental disorder and to optimize the conditions and solve the problem as good as possible with the optimal functional outcome for the patient. To achieve this often a collaboration with educational agencies and offices has to be established, but it is always important to maintain the medical claim of confidentiality. Necessary social assistance and educational support can not be directly medically prescribed in Germany, because it is not about health insurance benefits under SGB .
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Medical psychotherapy for children and adolescents
What is multimodal child therapy?
Modules of multimodal therapy for children
Effectiveness factors of multimodal therapy for children
Art in child and adolescent psychotherapy
