Involuntary Commitment - Deinstitutionalization

Deinstitutionalization

Starting in the 1960s, there has been a worldwide trend toward moving psychiatric patients from hospital settings to less restricting settings in the community, a shift known as "deinstitutionalization." Because the shift was typically not accompanied by a commensurate development of community-based services, critics say that deinstitutionalization has led to large numbers of people who would once have been inpatients being incarcerated in jails and prisons or becoming homeless when outpatient services are not available or they choose not to adhere to treatment outside the hospital. In some jurisdictions, laws authorizing court-ordered outpatient treatment have been passed in an effort to compel individuals with chronic, untreated severe mental illness to accept treatment while living outside the hospital.

Before the 1960s deinstitutionalization there were earlier efforts to free psychiatric patients. Doctor Philippe Pinel 1745 - 1826 ordered the removal of chains from patients.