Abstract

DELFINI, Patrícia Santos de Souza et al. Profile of patients from a psychosocial care centre for children and adolescents in São Paulo City, Brazil. Rev. bras. crescimento desenvolv. hum. [online]. 2009, vol.19, n.2, pp.226-236. ISSN 0104-1282.

Psychosocial Care Centres for children and adolescents (CAPSi) are the main services concerning Brazilian Psychiatric Reform and aim to the assistance of children and adolescents suffering from persistent psychic diseases. The objective of the paper is to describe the profile of patients of a CAPSi, considering sex, age, diagnosis, kind of referral, school insertion and reason for searching for the service. METHOD: data have been collected from all active patients files from a unit from São Paulo state, Brazil - one hundred and three - through a protocol. This paper shows partial data from a project entitled Epidemiologic and Social demographic characteristics of patients of the CAPSi from São Paulo state. RESULTS: most patients assisted in this service are between five and fifteen years old (68,9%) and are male (61,2%). Behavioural and emotional disorders afected 21,4% of all patients, followed by disorders of psychological development (16,2%) and mental retardation (10,5%). Patients were referred to the unit mostly by State Child Protection Agency (22,3%) and had motor neuronal problems (17,5%), school difficulties (15,5%) and social behavior matters (14,6%) as the main reasons for searching for assistance. CONCLUSIONS: the high number of motor neuronal problems may indicate specific characteristics of the unit, which has taken patients and professionals from an older outpatient rehabilitations service. The great number of relevant characteristics were not found in patients files may show lack of standard in registration.

Keywords : mental health; Psychosocial Care Centres; childhood; adolescence; patients´ profile.

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