title: A hospital-based mental health court.
abstract: Deinstitutionalized chronically mentally ill patients face the prospect of homelessness, insufficient community services, and the possibility of criminalization. Further, many communities do not have a mechanism for recognizing the special problems many of the chronically mentally ill have when they enter the legal system. The following is a description of a hospital-based mental health court, a nontraditional, highly effective program intended to identify chronically mentally ill persons in the community, as well as recognize and correct inadequacy in services available to the deinstitutionalized.
mesh_terms: D002908:Chronic Disease; D003415:Crime; D003688:Deinstitutionalization; D005555:Forensic Psychiatry; D006703:Ill-Housed Persons / Q000523:psychology; D006766:Hospitals, County; D006801:Humans; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000628:therapy*