Organization of services and pattern of psychiatric care in Nicaragua: Result of a survey in 1986

ABSTRACT— Organization of services and patterns of psychiatric care were studied in Nicaragua in 1986, 7 years after the substantial changes in health policy launched after the revolution. The overall re-organization of the system is indicated by the progressive abandoning of the mental hospital as the center of psychiatric care and the creation of 15 community-based mental health centers now functioning throughout the country. Quality of care judged through analysis of a consecutive sample of 342 patients seen by services over a month confirmed the positive orientation of the system which seemed able to deliver good care following the new perspective of “de-institutionalization”. Some problems emerged to a large extent common to psychiatric care in industrialized countries looking at psychotropic drug use and at the relationship between primary health care and the psychiatric system especially when care delivered in urban and rural areas was compared.