Social Skills Training in Chronically Mentally Ill Patients under Psychosocial Rehabilitation

Social skills training is a process that resembles the nursing process and its stages. It is one of the many social rehabilitation programs for chronic mental patients. It is also a process by which a health practitioner tries to diversify the existing state of chronic mental patients. It is a “set of cognitive-behavioral methods of social rehabilitation, which in a direct and active education, enhance and promote existing social skills. Alternatively, teaching new skills in chronic psychotic patients enables them to cope with the everyday demands of life, one the one hand, and to be protected from any symptoms of disease deterioration, on the other.” The purpose of this study is for mental health professionals to learn and to teach ways of communication, behaviors, and socialization between chronically mentally ill patients and other people, as well as to enhance their capacity for independent life in the community. Social skills training, tailored to a patient’s individual needs can help the patient to: (a) Develop and maintain personal relationships with other individuals, (b) take responsibility for medication, (c) find and maintain stable employment, (d) find and maintain permanent housing, ability to choose his/her preferred mode of recreation, and the opportunity to enjoy spare time, and (e) Maintain a level of functionality that enables the patient to live within a community and provides him/her with a minimum level of social skills, thereby enhancing his/her quality of life.