[Prevention and chronicity in community psychiatry.]

The author poses the problem of the chronic mental patient in 1977 in light of the commu-nity approach. During the 1950's the discovery of penicillin, the phenothiazines and the anti-depressants; the notion of institutional dementia as well as the rapid growth of physical health costs, formed the basis for a needed reform which took the guise of community psychiatry. The latter created many hopes (eg. the possible elimination of the asylum, the potential for preventive effects). In fact community mental health programs did produce a decrease in the hospitalized psychiatric population, a higher quality of hospital services, a change in the laws relating to the mentally ill, and an improvement in treatment, personnel competence as well as a stability in real health costs. But the 1970's brought disillusionment. The rate of psychotic disorder remains unchanged, the cost-benefit of the program is less than had been anticipated and, in addition, the community approach has transplanted the asylum to the city thus creating a new immigrant - the psychotic individual. Citing this failure, the author argues for a psychiatry focussed on research into the makeup of the internal psychotic dynamic and its treatment.