Community Psychiatry and Psychosocial Rehabilitation: Role of Nursing Personnel

Abstract

Community psychiatry focuses on the early detection, prevention, early treatment and rehabilitation of patients with emotional disorders and social deviance as they develop in the community rather than as encountered one-on-one, in private practice, or at larger centralized psychiatric facilities. Particular emphasis is placed on the social-interpersonal-environmental factors that contribute to mental illness. Nurses, being a part of health care team, play a very important role in community psychiatry and implementing the psychosocial rehabilitation. They are the direct care providers in implementing psychosocial rehabilitation at the grass root level.