Day hospital and psychosocial care center: Expanding the discussion of partial hospitalization in mental health.

Introduction: Since the second half of the twentieth century the discussions about mental patient care reveal ongoing debate between two health care paradigms: the biomedical/biopsychosocial paradigm and the psychosocial paradigm. The struggle for hegemony over the forms of care, on how to deal optimally with the experience of becoming ill is underpinned by an intentionality of reorganizing knowledge about the health/disease dichotomy, which is reflected in the models proposed for the implementation of actions and services for the promotion, prevention, care and rehabilitation of human health.

Objective: To discuss the guidelines of care in mental health day hospitals (MHDH) in contrast to type III psychosocial care centers (CAPS III).