Recovery

The growing interest in a changed view in relation to schizophrenia and chronicity, does manifest itself in a by now strong internatiotional Recovery Movement. Promoting the participation of carers and families, empowerment and the reorientation of research and practice has been the topic of many conferences and been the focus of training and further training. 

This new concept does not only promise greater therapeutic efficacy, but seeks to fulfill greater ethical standards above all. The power of the recovery model for the whole of psychiatric and psychosocial support was quickly understood and one can now observe a spreading and developmental process of this concept. 

Professor Dr. Michaela Amering and Margot Schmolke introduce recent recovery developments in their book "<LINK eu.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0470997966.html _blank>Recovery in Mental Health</link>". Of particular note here is the the following: the UN-disability rights convention of the year 2008, which by now has been ratified by 100 States, amongst them the FRG and Austria. The rights of people with psychiatric disabilities are explicitly part of this convention in this context. This, too, is not a matter of course, but a remarkable success of the international user movement. 

The WHO-EC's own empowerment partnership-project with its hundred empowerment practice examples and 19 indictors in the assessment of empowerment in different European countries, does connect with the European action plan. It thus offers orientation for the further development of empowerment orientated ways of working, guidelines and law making in Europe in the next few years (www.euro.who.int). 

The World Psychiatric Association did institute an initial working group in 2010, which is comprised trialogically, and whose recommendations on the inclusion of users and family members in all areas of psychiatric work in the global context, will provide essential impetusses (<LINK www.wpanet.org _blank>www.panet.org</link>).