Working Together in Sleidinge
Country
Belgium
Description
In a small village in Flanders, a psychiatric hospital started a few years ago to organise a popular fair to bring together the inhabitants of the village, the patients and the staff.
In 2004 the village was shocked by a double murder (an ex-patient killed two inhabitants). This crisis was the start of a regular dialog between inhabitants and the institution, for the inhabitants to have a way to prevent or solve problems with the patients, for the institution to de-stigmatise and to inform the inhabitants about the activities of the hospital.
A committee was created (inhabitants and patients) to take steps towards better mutual understanding:
- Every tree months there is a meeting with all the volunteers involved in the initiative.
- There is a direct contact point where any inhabitant can complain if he or she thinks that there is a problem.
- The hospital guarantees that there will be immediate action; sometimes they will try to explain what is happening, sometimes to correct the behaviour of patients.
- There is a magazine shop run by patients.
Aims
For patients and the inhabitants of the village to live peacefully together by:
- reacting very quickly to any complaint of an inhabitant about disturbing behaviour of a patient.
- informing the inhabitants about the life in the hospital.
Areas
Social services
Effectiveness
One year after a major incident (the killing of two people by an ex- patient) the inhabitants of the village have (again) accepted to live in close proximity with the patients and the staff of the hospital; they have common projects and common activities.
1.000 families (4.000 inhabitants) and 500 patients and staff members of the hospital participated in one or more activities.
Sustainability
Patients (and staff of the hospital) do participate in social life in the community.
Innovation
A modern psychiatric hospital tends to be a more or less (socially) isolated industry, concentrated on its core business: the cure off and the care for patients. The contact with the neighbourhood is forgotten, until an incident wakes up everybody.
Added Value
Care for and cure of patients is not something that can be reduced to the pure hospital settings, but is a social process where the whole community is concerned
A hospital is a part of the community; life doesnt stop at the gates of the hospital. A local community can't deny the fact that there are patients in the streets participating in social life.
Transferability
The project can easily be transferred.
Mainstreaming Potential
Both the policy of the local community as well as the policy of the hospital were concerned and adjusted.
Both had lived too long separately: a community where a psychiatric hospital is located, must consider to involve the inhabitants with the fact of patients being around.
A psychiatric hospital must consider that there are daily contacts of the village inhabitants and the patients.
Only when politicians and decision-makers on both sides are working together, there are no problems.
The project is a great example that if there is a good collaboration between patients and the community, even extreme incidents, e.g. the murdering of two people, does not have to stigmatise a whole group (of psychiatric patients).
Costs of the Project
The project had no special costs, since the whole action was incorporated in traditional activities, within the village (the yearly fair), and within the hospital. All work is done by volunteers (15 at the moment). The aim is to have 30 volunteers next year.
People involved in the Project (number of people and profession)
The whole community, the associations of the village and the patients of the hospital.
Strengths and Weaknesses of the Project
The strength is the involvement of the whole community, of all inhabitants. The weakness is the fact that it couldn't start until a major incident (killing of two people) occurred.
Contact Person for the Project
Peter Dierinck
PC Sleidinge
Weststraat135
9940 Sleidinge-Evergem
Tel: 09/358.04.11
http://www.pcsleidinge.be/