Assertive community treatment in Amsterdam

In Amsterdam in the Netherlands, in 1993, an intensive case management project was initiated. This article describes this well-known Dutch project as it was tested in a randomised clinical trial using regular outpatient and inpatient care as the control conditions. All the patients in this project are very ill and most of them suffer from schizophrenia. The new form of care has the same effect on everyday problems as regular care. The basis of this data is too narrow for the drawing of conclusions about the risk of suicide. Longer follow-up would be advisable in order to improve our understanding of this problem. There has been no drop in compulsory admissions. On the other hand, there has been a spectacular decrease in the number of bed days (a reduction of 66% in the second year of the ACT programme).