RESEARCH ARTICLE


Patient Opinions on the Helpfulness of External Rehabilitative Activities in Residential Psychiatric Care: A Pilot Study



Bruno Biancosino1, *, Luciana Marmai1, Federica Marchesini1, Raffaella Bertasi1, Gino Targa2, Raffaella Bivi2, Alessandro Cucchi3, Luigi Grassi1
1 Section of Psychiatry, University of Ferrara and Department of Mental Health, Ferrara, Italy
2 Department of Mental Health, Ferrara, Italy
3 Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine, University of Ferrara, Ferrara, Italy


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Creative Commons License
© Biancosino et al.; Licensee Bentham Open.

open-access license: This is an open access article licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted, non-commercial use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the work is properly cited.

* Address correspondence to this author at the Clinica Psichiatrica Università di Ferrara, Corso Giovecca 203 44100 Ferrara; Tel: +39 0532 236 409; Fax: +39 0532 212 240; E-mail: bruno.biancosino@unife.it


Abstract

Introduction:

This study explores the patient opinions about the helpfulness of the External Rehabilitative Activities (ERA) delivered in two residential facilities for psychiatric rehabilitation.

Methods:

We administered a Questionnaire developed to assess general helpfulness, helpfulness of specific therapeutic processes and satisfaction with the ERA to a sample of 46 psychiatric patients participating in at least three external activities.

Results:

The External Rehabilitative Activities, tested by the ERA-Questionnaire, were considered helpful or very helpful by most of the patients. The therapeutic process with the highest score was “relaxation”, followed by “general helpfulness”, “socialization”, “knowledge of social context”, “community integration”. The least-valued process was “autonomy”.

Conclusion:

This pilot study has shown that psychiatric patients consider ERA helpful and rate more helpful the specific therapeutic processes, such as relaxation and socialization, that assure symptomatic relief and interaction with the outside world.

Keywords: Psychiatric rehabilitation, psychiatric leisure rehabilitation, external rehabilitative activities, patients' opinion.