MEDICINE IN EUROPE - CARING FOR MENTALLY-ILL PEOPLE

Despite legislation to harmonise mental health practice throughout Europe and convergence in systems of training there remains an extraordinary diversity in psychiatric practice in Europe. Approaches to tackling substance misuse vary among nations; statistics on psychiatric morbidity are affected by different approaches to diagnosis and treatment of psychiatric disorders; attitudes towards mental illness show definite international differences. Everywhere, though, mental health care for patients with psychotic illnesses is a ''cinderella service,'' and there is a general move towards care falling increasingly on the family and the community.