The aim of the present work is to know the representations about the mental disease and the psychiatric reform, according to the opinion of some mental health professionals as well as of some family members of those who suffer from that disease and are kept in mental hospitals. For this purpose, semistructured interviews were made with 25 professionals including psychiatrists, psychologists, head-nurses, nurse technicians, and social workers, and 24 family members of institutional patients in the city of João Pessoa-PB. Such interviews were analyzed according to the thematic content analysis. The resulting data show that there is still a predominance of pejorative and stereotyped views about the mentally disordered person, who is seen as a senseless or a brainless being and as a child who needs to be taken care of and protected. On the other hand, the mental hospital is seen positively, whereas the psychiatric reform is shown as something negative that will let the mental patient free to cause affliction to his/her family and to the population.
Social exclusion; Mentally diseased people; Psychiatric reform; Family; Professionals
