Romanian Association of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy. Mental Health for All

Doina Cozman (MD, PhD) is professor of clinical psychology at the “Iuliu Haţieganu” University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Cluj-Napoca, Romania. She founded the first non-governmental organization of suicidology and the first crisis line in Romania – The Anti-Suicide Green Line (Telefonul Verde Antisuicid). She had been for many years the national representative of Romania in the International Association for the Study of Pain (IASP). She was awarded in 2011 with the Kraepelin-Alzheimer Medal from the “Ludwig Maximilians” University of Munich as recognition for her merits in the research of suicidology.

Professor Cozman has a rich publishing activity in different languages (Romanian, French and English), being author and co-author of monographs focused on suicidal behavior and mental health, such as: Suicide Prevention in Romania (in D. Wasserman and C. Wasserman (ed.), Oxford Textbook of Suicidology and Suicide Prevention); Suicidology (Lambert Academic Publishing); Medical Psychology (Ed. Polirom) etc. She also published more than 70 articles cited in international prestigious journals (Lancet, 2015; Lancet Psychiatry, 2016). She is the CEO of Romanian Alliance for Suicide Prevention and President-Elect of the Romanian Association of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy.

The Romanian Association of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy (ARPP) is the national professional association of psychiatrist from Romania. ARPP was born in 1990, with the main objective to support the specific activities from the field of psychiatry and mental health in Romania. ARPP is affiliated to international organizations, such as WPA and EPA.

ARPP endeavored to create legislative regulations that corresponded to the Romanian population needs regarding mental health, not neglecting the desideratum of respecting the dignity of  those suffering from psychiatric disorders. Thus, an ARRP working group elaborated the Mental Health Law, which was approved as Law 487, in 2002.

The ARPP objectives are strongly correlated to the goals of European Pact of Mental Health and Wellbeing, launched in 2008 by the European Commission. Taking into account the priority action field for 2019 of this pact – namely, area regarding actions related to prevention of suicide and depression –, ARRP initiated a POCU project in order to train 900 professionists (psychiatrists, nurses, clinical psychologists) from the Romanian mental health field. 

ARPP guides itself according to WHO slogan: “There is no health without mental health”. As a result, the association supports the research in psychiatry, psychotherapy and in related scientific areas, organizing conferences and symposia each year, as well as the National Congress of Psychiatry, every three years, with the participation of prestigious national and international key speakers.

The Romanian Association of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy is present in our society through the relation with state institutions and with mass media. Our association reacts by statements and press conferences regarding litigious events which took place in psychiatric institutions or in cases of crimes committed by people with psychiatric disorders. Through these actions, ARPP is an active factor in fighting social stigma faced by people with mental disorders. Furthermore, our organization enables the access to psychiatric or non-psychiatric health care of all social categories.

ARPP together with the Romanian Association of Social Psychiatry (APSRo) militate for the development of the community psychiatry network, for the social and professional inclusion of people with mental disorders, for preventing drug consumption in young persons and, last but not least, for training the staff from psychiatric institutions into the field of social psychiatry.    

It is a privilege for the Romanian Association of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy to be partner to the organization, this year, of the 23^rd WASP Congress, in Bucharest (25-28 of October), with Prof. Dr. Doina Cozman, president-elect of ARPP, as a representative in the organizing committee.