[Intensive psychiatric care of children and adolescents in their natural environment : Alternatives to inpatient treatment].

Mental health disorders are one of the main diseases in children and adolescents, the persistence rate into adulthood being around 50%. Early intervention is therefore essential. However, present treatment options reach only 50% of children and adolescents with mental health problems.The objective of this article is to depict why legal deficits complicated the establishment of outreach treatment in the past and to illustrate recent legal changes that now allow innovative outreach treatment programs that meet the need of children and adolescents with mental health issues.This review is based on pertinent publications that were retrieved by a selective literature search in PubMed and Cochrane Library concerning types of home treatment in child and adolescent psychiatry, with due reference to the authors' own experience with intensive home treatment.The literature shows that outreach work has been effective in many other countries. In Germany however, clear separation in finances between outpatient and inpatient treatment did not allow the establishment of outreach teams in the past. On 01.01.2017 a new law, the PsychVVG, entered into force, and now provides a sound legal basis for outreach work. Home treatment in the form of, for example, intensive outreach work that equals the intensity and frequency of inpatient treatment (StäB) or continuum of care school (CCSchool), a project that joins school-based diagnostic elements with school-based treatment, can now be installed and evaluated.Intensive outreach work, especially in child and adolescent psychiatry, will now be a good alternative to inpatient treatment that integrates parents into the treatment approach.