[Ethnomedical and transcultural psychiatric aspects of migration]

In consideration of the current socioeconomical and political development in the world a dramatic increase of migration streams are expected. Migrant families are always a new phenomenon on both sides in host countries. One important root of these specific problems are: Culture-conditioned differences concerning value orientation between immigrants of several ethnics on one hand and the resident population on the other hand, but also among the immigrants of several ethnic groups themselves. These differences of the value orientation, of course, also refer to the illness concepts, the illness behavior as well as utilization of assistance among the several sectors of the Health Care Systems. It is expected that the professional sector of the Health Care Systems in the host countries will be confronted massively with ethnomedical and transcultural-psychiatric aspects of migration in the future. An adequate medical care of the migrants (especially concerning psychiatric disorders) will only be possible in case of an appropriate consideration of such culture-bound peculiarities.