Mental Health in Veneto Region
According to the Italian legislation the responsibility for guaranteeing an equal minimum standard of mental health services to all citizens living in their territories lies on Regions. Regions carry out their duties in this field through Local Health Authorities: each LHA must have a Mental Health Department.
The MHD is responsible for planning and coordinating all mental health services working in the LHA, including both hospital and community-based services and aiming at the integration between social and health services.
The Veneto region approach to Mental Health services is based on the 1978 Italian Mental Health Act, which determined a radical shift from mental hospitals to community-care through the closure of existing Mental Health Hospitals, the provision of a few beds for acute psychiatric emergencies in general hospitals, the establishment of a wide range of community-based services and the definition of strict rules for compulsory treatment.
The premises of the 1978 Act lies on a holistic (bio-psycho-social) approach to mental illness and the assumptions that mentally ill people pose no danger to society and hospitalization makes mental illness chronic instead of treating, curing or, at least easing it. Our view is that de-istitutionalization works were supported by a wide range of community-based services.
- Veneto region [pdf 51KB]
- Veneto in numbers [pdf 5,4MB]
- The Veneto (Regional) Government [pdf 51KB]
- The Italian NHS [pdf 60KB]
- Roles and Responsabilities of Mental Health Services in Veneto [pdf 55KB]
- Veneto Region: Health system review, 2012 [pdf 5MB]
- An Overview of the mental health system in Italy [pdf 160KB]
- Service Development in Italy [pdf 331KB]
- Feeling, being and doing well [pdf 160KB]
- Community-based services :challenge for a whole community [pdf 217KB]
- Residential Homes for mentally ill people [pdf 49KB]
- Building the economic case for investment in mental health and monitoring of outcomes of particular actions [pdf 370KB]
- Mental health Systems in the European Union Member States, status of mental health in populations and benefits to be expected from investments into mental health, European Commission, July 2013 - Italy: pages 253-266 (pdf 5Mb)
Joint Action on Mental Health and Well-being. WP7 on Mental Health and Schools
Data ultimo aggiornamento: 29 ottobre 2013