Actitudes de los profesionales de la Salud Mental hacia las personas con esquizofrenia / [Attitudes of mental health workers toward people with schizophrenia].

OBJECTIVE: Stigma is a social and universal phenomenon which constitutes the core of various social barriers. Stigmatizing attitudes of mental health workers influence the outcome of patients and affect their recovery. Our purpose was to determine some attitudes and social distance of mental health workers toward people with schizophrenia. METHODS: 517 mental health workers were surveyed at two national conferences in Argentina. RESULTS: More than 90

believed that patients have the right to know their diagnosis, but only 64

informed it. Psychiatrists and men professionals were more likely to inform the diagnosis. Eighteen per cent thought that the voting right of people with schizophrenia should be revoked, 13

believed that this group should not have children and 63.7

believed that people with schizophrenia can recover completely. There was a statistical difference in the social distance according to health workers’ gender, years of experience and the percentage of patients assisted. CONCLUSIONS: There exist social distance and stigmatizing attitudes toward people with schizophrenia among mental health workers. The contact could help to reduce social distance. Anti-stigmatizing education programs should be directed toward mental health workers since their initial training.

El P.R.E.A., una experiencia alternativa a las lógicas manicomiales / P.R.E.A. (Rehabilitation and assisted outpatient care program): an alternate experience to the Asylum logic

El propósito del siguiente escrito es dar a conocer el trabajo realizado desde hace ya 9 años en el Programa de Rehabilitación y Externación Asistida (P.R.E.A.) en el Hospital “Estevez", de Temperley, Provincia de Buenos Aires. Se intenta dar cuenta del contexto histórico-político que dio origen al surgimiento de este programa, así como de las distintas actividades que el mismo realiza a través de sus dispositivos para lograr el objetivo primordial del P.R.E.A.: la externación y reinserción social de personé con años de internación, cronificadas en la institución neuropsiquiátrica. Es el relato de una experiencia que, junto con otras ya consolidadas en nuestro país y en el mundo, demuestran a las claras que existen alternativas prácticas y sustentables a la manicomialización y al encierro en el tratamiento del padecimiento mental severo y la cronicidad. Y que eso es posible en las condiciones concretas de nuestra provincia y nuestro sistema público de salud.

The purpose of the following article is show the work that has been going on for the past nine years in the Assisted Discharge and Rehabilitation Program (PREA, from its Spanish initials), at the Estevez Hospital, Temperley, Province of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Our aim is to describe the historical and political context that gave rise to this program as well as the different activities carried out through its mechanisms to achieve the program's main objective: institutional discharge and resocialization of long-term patients with high chronicity in the psychiatric facility. This is the account of an experiment which, together with other similar ones already carried out in our country and elsewhere in the world, proves clearly that there are practical al sustainable alternatives to institutionalization and confinement for the treatment of serious mental disorders and chronicity and that this is feasible within our province's current situation and our public health system.