[Future Images of General Hospital Psychiatry]

Now, the psychiatric departments of general hospitals are unpopular workplaces for psy- chiatrists in Japan. However, I think there is a constant need for psychiatric departments of general hospitals, because the number of psychiatric departments of general hospitals with no psychiatric beds is increasing, even though the number of psychiatric departments of general hospitals with psychiatric beds is decreasing. Recently, there has been a trend of reevaluating psychiatry in medical care, such as in the medical treatments fees or in health care planning, so we cannot talk about medical care without involving psychiatry. The participation of gen- eral hospital psychiatry with a medical cooperation function is necessary for psychiatric reform from hospital-based to community-based psychiatry, as well as for the promotion of self-suffi- cient medical care in local communities based on medical cooperation. For psychiatry corre- sponding to high-grade acute medical care, the existence of general hospital psychiatry is nec- essary which has close contact with medical care and has a psychiatric acute care function, and adequate measures should be adopted in the national medical care fee and medical policies for the enhancement of general hospital psychiatry.