[Community assistance programme for children and adolescents with severe mental illness]

The purpose of the following paper is to present an experience which links the production of knowledge resulting from academic research, with the transmission of said knowledge to the health system -with specific reference to mental health- by means of the implementation of the Community Assistance Programme for Children and/or Adolescents within the City of Buenos Aires. This programme is aimed at children and adolescents afflicted with severe psychological suffering, who consult the Mental Health Services in the public subsector of the City of Buenos Aires. It is the product of clinical institutional experience and of diverse investigations in health systems and services which showed a significant increase in the amount of consultations of children with severe and or complex mental health problems and which brought to light the lack of adequate sanitary response for these children by said sector. Based on the analysis and evaluation of the difficulties and obstacles in the functioning of the system a scheme was devised and implemented which aimed -from its beginning- to favour the possibilities of subjective constitution and integration into the community of these children and adolescents with severe mental deficiencies. By means of an interdisciplinary work consisting in the permanent training of human resources and the setup of intra and intersectional networks, it aims at facilitating accessibility and improving equality of opportunity, thus attempting to guarantee the right to a full protection of the health of children and adolescents.