[Involuntary commitment of the psychiatric patient: legal regulations and critical aspects]

Traditionally, medical care received by psychiatric patients involved their separation from the society through their isolation in closed institutions, thereby setting a stigmatising trend on the sick, and by extension on mental illness, a practice that somehow has remained until now. The profound changes in the field of psychiatry have been important and are reflected in the therapeutic field, as well as in the legislative one, and have contributed to establish changes concerning the social opinion about psychiatric patients. The purpose of this article is to review, from the critical perspective, the current legislative framework concerning the situation of involuntary psychiatric commitment as a therapeutic measure in the psychiatric patient, as well as the legal medical practice which indicates the lack of legal skills and ethical and professional conduct arising in the field of primary care.