(De)institutionalization: the perception of Psychosocial Care Enter professionals in Santa Catarina, Brazil

Abstract

Deinstitutionalization implies to challenge, criticize and deconstruct paradigms. In the health field, not only refers to hospitalized patients but to other actors, including professionals and family members. In this article we discuss deinstitutionalization in its antithetical relationship with the phenomenon of institutionalization of individuals suffering from mental disorders. Through an exploratory and descriptive research study we analyzed, using an hermeneutic-dialectics approach, the perceptions of professionals working at Centers for Psychosocial Care (CAPS) in the State of Santa Catarina, southern Brazil regarding deinstitutionalization. Twelve CAPS coordinators were interviewed and an open questionnaire was applied to 24 professionals then working in the 12 state CAPS. The majority understand the idea of deinstitutionalization as presented by the National Mental Health Policy based upon the tenets of the Brazilian Psychiatric Reform movement but have difficulty in applying them in their daily practice. Some professionals use de-institutionalization and dehospitalization as synonims and some believe that they are reproducing, in the Centers, the asylum model. Actions toward deinstitutionalization have not been taken in Santa Catarina or are feeble.

Deinstitutionalization; Institutionalization; Center for Psychosocial Care; Psychiatric Reform