Nicaragua implements the mental health model of Catalonia

Drissa Foundation leads a mental health project in Bluefields, Nicaragua together with the Therapeutic Community of the Maresme (a region of Catalonia). In this territory there are approximately three hundred thousand inhabitants and the CAPS (Center for Social Psychosocial Care) is the only resource that exists to address mental health problems in the Region. In 2010, the Community published a book that explains the development of the project from its beginnings. The project is currently underway.

According to the director of the Drissa Foundation, Núria Martinez, the model of care applied corresponds to a model of community psychiatry and the disposition of the planned resources corresponds to the model deployed in Catalonia. The CAPS, in the form of a Mental Health Center, is the center of the circuit and is linked to the "Health Positions" where primary health care is given.

In other words, the CAPS is responsible for the promotion of health, prevention in specific subjects and the work of outpatient care. In the same place, but in different spaces, there is the Day Center where patients with TMS (severe mental disorders) who require rehabilitative work are treated.

The CAPS also supports the additions with a specific program provided and directed by the professionals. Prevention programs are carried out at the Bluefields Schools. underway there is the construction of a Therapeutic Community, that is to say, a resource to which it would correspond to the hospitalization of subacute patients or of patients with an addiction that require a hospitable time of average stages and a bio- psycho-social

Emergencies and patients who require a bed of acute are taken care of at the Bluefields hospital where four permanent beds are now deployed for acute patients. The longest hospitalizations, or the hospitalizations that require more important containment, are derived from the Psychiatric Hospital of Managua.

The CAPS actively participates in the mental health education of the students of the School of Nursing of the BICU where they make a stay the students of 2º and 3er course.
In the CAPS and by a pact with the Ministry of Interior and Justice a program of prevention and care for victims of family violence is developed.

Also there's a program to prevent suicide in contact with the Regional Government. At this time, the multidisciplinary team of the CAPS made up of Nicaraguan personnel has been in terms of a budget, mostly obtained by MINSA, the Ministry of Health of Nicaragua, the facilities and its maintenance for the Bluefields Day.

This fact guarantees its continuity and is now a benchmark throughout Nicaragua. It also allows the contributions of the cooperation to complement the team, create and expand the functions developed and deepen in the training of the team and in the actions of the community and its institutions. 

The CTM and the Drissa Foundation periodically send professionals to guarantee the training of the team and to introduce objectives for improvement and relationship with the local authorities. At the same time to participate in scientific events or dissemination and consolidation of the project in different locations and platforms in Nicaragua.