CPG for Psychosocial Interventions in Severe Mental ... - GuíaSalud

6. Social Benefits for people with severe mental illness
The first thing is to define the scope of this perspective of the treatment, and to do this we must
point out that, in social intervention, the rehabilitation concept refers to the improvement of capacities
or skills, to the series of supports or conditions necessary for a person to maintain a
certain level of functioning, including both improving and maintaining or preventing a worse
situation from being prolonged, even temporarily.
Its target of action is not only the specific individual who has a long-term severe mental
illness but it also covers the person and the context. The rehabilitation work focuses, therefore,
apart from on the user, on the family, friends, supports, social environment and any other relevant
elements to satisfy the intervention objectives established in this individualised process.
Importance of health resources and coordination with social care
The Mental Health Services, in any of its forms, depending on the implementation peculiarity in
the different Autonomous Communities (mental health centres, mental health services, mental
health teams, mental health units, or any similar entity) are the axis that articulates the care for
people with severe mental illness and therefore the parties responsible for the treatments and
those that must guarantee continuity of care. Therefore, those that must channel the care with
other social devices but base them on the specific care if it is confirmed that the care has to be
provided under this principle of continuity.
How to defi ne continuity of care
The Mental Health Services Care Continuity Programmes are aimed at facilitate the person included
therein with the treatment, rehabilitation, care and community support that adapts best to
their pathology and their time of life.
This care continuity must be expressed by specifically organising actions that can be divided,
in general, into the following intervention groups:
• Mental health services of centres
• General or grass-roots social services
• Hospitals
• Primary health care
• Specific rehabilitation resources in mental health
• Other resources that are linked to the user’s situation and that complement their needs for
care and promotion of autonomy.
• Family members and users associations
• Normalised resources
Defi nition of the social services system
It is the series of services and benefits, which, together with other elements of Social Welfare,
aim to:
– Promote and fully develop all people and groups in society, to obtain greater social welfare
and a better quality of life, within a setting of co-existence.
– Prevent and eliminate the causes that lead to social marginalisation and exclusion.
– All of this is done through public services and structures of the State Administration,
Autonomous Communities and Local Corporations.
CLINICAL PRACTICE GUIDELINES FOR PSICHOSOCIAL INTERVENTIONS IN SEVERE MENTAL ILLNESS 127