Covid has closed one in five mental health centers

(ANSA) - ROME, JANUARY 16 - During the first lock down, 20% of the Centers were closed.The first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic reduced the activities of the Mental Health Services in our country, therefore 20% of outpatients remained closed and 25% reduced access hours. This is underlined by the data of a study by the Italian Society of Psychiatry (SIP) published on Bmc Psychiatry and presented at the inauguration of the first Italian conference of DSM Directors. The network was created to cope with the difficulties of operating essential services that have long been severely tested by the lack of staff and the scarcity of the resources made available to them in our country. Scheduled psychiatric visits, at home and in the office, were guaranteed only for the most serious patients, often replaced by remote interviews. All activities had a significant decrease, such as hospital psychiatric consultations (-30%), individual psychotherapies (-60%), group psychotherapies and psychosocial interventions (-90 / 95%), monitoring of cases in residential structures (-40%) and of offenders with mental disorders entrusted by the courts to mental health centers (-45%). As in other medical disciplines, there was an overall reduction in hospitalizations (-87%). Mood disorders, psychosis, anxiety disorders and suicide attempts are the most frequent problems of psychiatric counseling; 21.4% of the wards report a worrying increase in aggression, violence and hospitalizations in TSOs (8.6% of cases). (continues). (HANDLE).