Across the country, children and adolescents with mental health needs may find they lack access to psychiatric care. As a national leader in telepsychiatry, NYU Langone’s Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry is spearheading efforts to address this shortage through the use of telepsychiatry to connect patients with clinicians at a distance.

Our department has been providing telepsychiatry services for the past decade within New York City and in communities across New York state, in settings including homes, schools, emergency rooms, inpatient units, and day treatment programs.

We offer the option of video visits with our Child Study Center clinicians, which allows patients and families to conveniently connect with their doctors from home using a secure video platform. Learn more about video visits.

We use telepsychiatry for pediatric psychiatry consultations in the KiDS Emergency Department at Tisch Hospital; Kimmel Pavilion inpatient units; and NYU Langone Orthopedic Hospital. At the Family Health Centers at NYU Langone, we offer telepsychiatry in school-based clinics and into patients’ homes.

In collaboration with the New York State Office of Mental Health, Rockland Children’s Psychiatric Center, and Elmira Psychiatric Center, we provide telepsychiatry into schools, day treatment programs, and inpatient units in underserved counties across the state.

At NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue, the oldest public hospital in the United States and an affiliate of NYU Langone, our department faculty provide telepsychiatry in settings including outpatient clinics, juvenile justice settings, inpatient units, and patients’ homes.

Expanding Telepsychiatry Access

In addition to serving patient populations, our telepsychiatry program is developing nationwide models to allow the nation’s 8,300 practicing child psychiatrists to better reach the estimated 13 percent of U.S. children who experience a psychiatric disorder annually. A study in Pediatrics found that in both 2007 and 2016, 70 percent of counties had no pediatric psychiatrists.

Our telepsychiatry program, led by Shabana Khan, MD, assistant professor of child and adolescent psychiatry and director of child and adolescent telepsychiatry, aims to expand and provide tele-education to mental health professionals nationally who may not have easy access to educational resources and specialty consultations. This will allow more children and adolescents to receive evidence-based behavioral healthcare.

Telepsychiatry Education and Training

Providing faculty and trainee education and training in telemedicine is a priority for our department. We operate telepsychiatry training clinics for residents and NYU Grossman School of Medicine students.

Dr. Khan, who co-chairs the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP) Telepsychiatry Committee, is collaborating with Sandra M. DeJong, MD, assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and colleagues on the telepsychiatry committee to develop a nationally accessible online pediatric telepsychiatry curriculum for use by child psychiatry fellows, fellowship program directors, and practicing child psychiatrists.

Policy makers and legislators are increasingly recognizing the power of telemedicine to expand patient access while improving quality of care and reducing costs. Our department has informed telemedicine legislation, policy, and regulations at the state and federal level in collaboration with national professional organizations including AACAP, the American Psychiatric Association, and the American Telemedicine Association.

Contact Us

To learn more about our telepsychiatry program, please contact Dr. Khan at dcap.telepsychiatry@nyulangone.org.