The Future of Community Psychiatry

Leaders of national groups that have focused on issues of community and social psychiatry present their ideas about the future of psychiatry. They identify five areas: theory development; the relevance of community psychiatry in the 21st century; education and training; the relationship between community psychiatry and health maintenance organizations; and role of community psychiatry in bridging medical science with humanism. The unifying theme for these topics is that community psychiatry can be a vehicle for modifying general psychiatry's propensity towards individualism and reductionism by offering a more holistic and integrative approach to illness and well-being.