Deinstitutionalisation in the Netherlands.

In the Netherlands mental hospitals and psychiatric departments in general hospitals kept the initiative in implementing community-based replacements for inpatient care. The goal of this study is to determine to what extent day treatment, sheltered residences and assertive home treatment were effective alternatives, rather than additions to inpatient care. All adult users and their use of intensive community- and hospital-based services between 1989 and 1997 were retrieved from the Groningen case register. Statistics about changes in the use of mental health care provisions were corrected for changes in the population as to size and age. The number of patients in day treatment, sheltered residences and in particular home treatment grew between 1989 and 1997 to a large degree, as did their average use of these services. In that same period inpatient care lost some, though not many patients, but the average length of their stay in the hospital was reduced by 33%. Analysis of treated incidence and prevalence showed that the implementation of alternatives to hospital-based care did not attract new patients but kept patients longer in mental health care.