Dispensaries for mental health, mobile teams, anonymous counseling centers, as well as a larger number of psychiatric teams in public health institutes, are some of the innovations foreseen in the action plan for the protection of mental health in the community, which is in a one-month public consultation, writes N1.
In three years, 20 mobile teams for chronic, intensive treatment and crisis situations will be established, according to the Draft Action Plan for the Implementation of a Community Mental Health Care System by 2027.
The teams will be established within the mental health dispensaries at health centers and will conduct home visits. The psychological teams should include a clinical psychologist, a psychiatric specialist, a social pedagogue, a special education teacher, a social worker, and a nurse, in order to provide timely professional assistance to citizens and implement prevention.
The goal is to reduce the rate of hospitalizations
Mobile teams, among other things, will be trained to operate in crisis situations such as pandemics, earthquakes, natural disasters, the consequences of climate change, and other crises.
At the same time, the plan is to reduce the hospitalization rate and the number of beds in psychiatric wards and psychiatric hospitals. The goal is to gradually redirect patients from these hospitals to services in the local community (dispensaries and psychological teams in health centers, community mental health centers).
The teams will also include people with personal experience of mental illness. “Peer” counselors, based on their own experience, will voluntarily provide psychosocial support to people with mental disabilities.
Among the measures that will be taken is the education of persons who encounter people with mental disabilities in their work (e.g. police, social welfare, educational institutions).
The Draft Action Plan highlights the high prevalence of mental health disorders that begin in young adulthood, impair the quality of life of sufferers and their families, and increase morbidity and mortality from physical illnesses.
The most infected people are in Koprivnica-Križevci County
Mental disorders are stigmatizing, cause great subjective suffering and reduce the quality of life of sufferers and their environment. They are characterized by psychological, biological and social dysfunction of the individual, and include a whole range of symptoms and disorders.
In 2022, a total of 30.522 hospitalizations due to mental disorders were recorded, and this group, with a share of 5,1 percent, ranked 10th in the total number of hospitalizations in Croatia.
At the primary health care level, the most common diagnosis is neurotic disorders related to stress, and somatoform disorders, i.e. physical symptoms underlying a mental disorder.
An analysis of morbidity by county shows that mental disorders in the total morbidity are most pronounced in Koprivnica-Križevci County (5,7 percent), and least pronounced in Istria County (3,4 percent).
There were also 160.165 registered people whose disability was caused by a mental disorder and 4730 people with diagnoses from the autism spectrum, i.e. these diagnoses represent around 30 percent of all causes of disability.
Functional disability is most often caused by organic and symptomatic mental disorders (35.472 people) and schizophrenia, schizotypal and delusional disorders (30.131 people).
115,6 million euros secured for implementation
There is a trend of decreasing suicide rates, and mental disorders account for around 2 to 3 percent of total mortality in Croatia.
In 2022, a total of 1876 deaths due to mental disorders were registered, making this group the 8th leading cause of death with a share of 3,29 percent.
The most common diagnoses were unspecified dementia (1003 cases), alcohol-related disorders (335 cases), and personality and behavioral disorders due to brain disease, damage, and dysfunction (281 cases).
Currently, mental health care in Croatia is mainly provided in hospitals, while outpatient services in the community are still insufficient, according to the draft action plan.
Compared to hospital services, community mental health networks are associated with better service delivery outcomes (better access, fewer coercive measures and human rights violations), as well as better outcomes for users (better quality of life, participation in treatment, less stigma, housing stability and work rehabilitation).
115,6 million euros have been secured for the three years of implementation of the Action Plan.
Source: N1
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