The concept of mental health promotion has recently been introduced and the focus of mental health care shifted from institutionalization to community integration. The characteristics and needs of clients are becoming diverse with regard to community-...
The concept of mental health promotion has recently been introduced and the focus of mental health care shifted from institutionalization to community integration. The characteristics and needs of clients are becoming diverse with regard to community-based services. Increasing demands are being placed on practitioners of community mental health. Theses include linking and coordinating services affered not only within the mental health system, but also in other related services in the fields of social welfare, education, religion, criminal justice, and labor. The ultimate goal of this type of service linkage is on providing comprehensive and continuous service, and it is therefore crucial that practitioners recognize various methods of service coordination and make efforts to adopt these in their practice. This paper explains several mechanisms and models of service coordination and examines the extent to which these strategies are used in the field of domestic mental health. It also discusses factors affecting the use of such strategies and makes suggestions for assertive utilization of coordination strategies in the mental health field.