The term psychosocial rehabilitation means equipping people with social, vocational, educational and interpersonal skills to enable them to choose their own future.

The growing recognition that a large proportion of people suffering from schizophrenia and mood disorders experience long-term disability, with persistent symptoms or relapsing episodes of illness, has given rise to the field of psychiatric rehabilitation. A chronic mental illness is an illness in which the diagnosis of the illness is prolonged. The incidence rate of severe mental disorder in the world is 35 out of 1 lakh people who need rehabilitation. 80% of these problems can be dealt with effectively. Psychiatric rehabilitation is therefore a process, which helps the individual find an alternative to hospitalization.

Psychiatric rehabilitation emphasizes the continuous and indefinite treatment of life-long disorders to keep symptoms under control, prevent or reduce relapses of illness and optimize performance by chronically ill patients in social, vocational educational and familiar roles requiring minimal assistance, such as helping occupations. Rehabilitation is a supportive process in which the client is motivated, facilitated and encouraged to regain his lost skills and develop his remaining skills so that he can become a functional member of the society.

The rehabilitation plan for each individual is different depending upon the type of illness, duration, socio-cultural factors, severity, family background etc. Teamwork is one of the very important factors in the process of rehabilitation. Team cooperation and coordination is very essential for the success of the rehabilitation program.