Child and Adolescent Services
Families invest enormous resources to help children grow up successfully. We want them to be happy; to be able to form strong, loving relationships; and to have the skills and confidence to make their own way in life. Usually, that investment succeeds, creating great joy and benefit to everyone. When that happens, parents take justifiable pride in their offspring, knowing that society can turn to them to contribute positively to our community.
Yet, all too often, the process of growing up goes awry, either temporarily or permanently. Children and adolescents may become unhappy, struggle with isolation and fear, get involved with drugs or alcohol, fail in school, become violent, contemplate or even attempt suicide, engage in self-destructive behaviors, or otherwise show signs and symptoms of a severe mental illness. Those are times of great sorrow, uncertainty, and frustration; for, when our youth are troubled, the impact usually goes far beyond their lives to affect family, peers, schools, and even society as a whole.
So, children and adolescents are both incredibly precious and enormously vulnerable. Psychiatric disorders impair the ability of at least 1 in 10 children to make the best use of their early years. For many, problems that first emerge when they are young will greatly affect the rest of their life. A growing body of evidence shows clearly that early, effective diagnosis and treatment can improve the life course of many of these young people. Yet, in California, fewer than 1 in 5 of the estimated 1 million children and adolescents with emotional disturbances receive any form of treatment. Our youth need and deserve early, accurate diagnosis and prompt age-appropriate interventions.
The Child and Adolescent Services at Langley Porter Psychiatric Hospital and Clinics facilitates transformations for the children and adolescents of Northern California and beyond. Superb clinical care, influential research, and top-ranked education are the foundations of UCSF’s national leadership in child psychiatry.
401 Parnassus Avenue
San Francisco, CA 94143
415-476-7231
415-476-7163 (fax)
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