ABSTRACT
Decades ago, in the 1950s, when the locus of care was shifting from the hospital to the community, the innovative practitioners of the day found ways to combat what was called at the time the institutional neurosis-the posturing, the restless pacing, incontinence and unpredictable violence which were bred by the restrictions, regimentation and emptiness of hospital life. Humanizing the hospital wards and establishing “therapeutic communities,” which changed the power relationships between staff and patients and involved patients in ward management, led to a reversal of this institutionally ingrained behavior (M.Jones, 1968; Clark, 1974).
