Crisis intervention in theory and practice: a selective review.

Crisis intervention is a model for the treatment of acute states of psychological decompensation, including some formal psychiatric disorders. In addition to crisis resolution the intervention maximizes the related potential for psychic growth and maturation, and so represents an important tool in preventive psychiatry. Crisis intervention provides the conceptual framework for an increasing number of community-based multidisciplinary psychiatric services. In this paper, a selective review of the literature is presented in order to outline crisis theory and the practice of crisis intervention.