Community Mental Health Care in Serbia: Development and Perspectives

Community mental health care was developed in Serbia in 1982 at the Belgrade Institute of mental health. Treatment was provided through the primary health care system, with each health centre having its own mental health care team. However, in the process of psychiatric reform and deinstitutionalization, dedicated community centres had to be established, in accordance with the National Strategy for the Development of Mental Health Care. The first community-based mental health centre opened in the southern area of Serbia in 2005 and subsequently, other centres were established. The centres are organized independently of psychiatric hospitals and are located in local, self-government units, providing psychosocial treatment and the continuation of mental health care. In relation to the ongoing reform of psychiatry in the country, there are positive and negative issues. There are 41.41 beds per 100,000 of the population in psychiatric hospitals and 18.33 beds per 100,000 of the population in the psychiatric departments of general hospitals. Day hospitals, established throughout the country, provide patients with good quality care. Mental health care professionals are educated to a high standard and integrative, person-centred treatment is applied in most services. However, the level of stigma directed towards those with mental illness is still high and constitutes a barrier to treatment. Well-developed screening and early detection programmes to identify persons requiring mental health care are lacking, as are the records of patients with mental disorders. The future goal is to further reduce the number of beds in psychiatric hospitals, establish new community mental health care services throughout the country and ensure the prevention of mental disorders, as well as mental health promotion.