Where is the path to recovery when psychiatric hospitalization becomes too difficult?

doi: 10.3969/j.issn.1002-0829.2012.01.005 Shanghai Mental Health Center, Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, Shanghai, China. Correspondence: [email protected] The modern history of mental health services in China dates back to the founding of the first psychiatric hospital in Guangzhou by the missionary physician John Kerr in 1898. By the time of liberation in 1949 China’s population was already 500 million but there were only 10 mental health institutions, 1 100 psychiatric beds and 50-60 psychiatrists in the country. Health services developed rapidly in the 1950s but by 1957 there were still only 70 psychiatric hospitals with 11 000 beds and less than 500 psychiatrists.