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Child psychiatry is a subspecialty of psychiatry that focuses on treating mental illness, learning disorders, and other conditions in children and adolescents. Child psychiatrists require more training than non-specialist psychiatrists and work closely with other specialists to create effective treatments. They can work in various areas, including education, research, and child protection agencies. Training includes four years of medical school, three years of general psychiatry residency, and two years of child psychiatry residency.
Child psychiatry is a specialty of psychiatric medicine and is more often referred to as child and adolescent psychiatry. Its focus is to treat, from multiple perspectives, children and adolescents who suffer from mental illness, learning disorders or difficulties or other conditions. Although this area of medicine is now a widely accepted discipline and subspecialty of psychiatry, it was not until the latter half of the 20th century that the idea of creating a separate specialty designation gained traction. Today, a person who is a child psychiatrist generally has more training than a physician licensed as a non-specialist psychiatrist.
The emphasis in psychiatry is on the treatment and diagnosis of mental disorders, but this is seen somewhat differently in child psychiatry. Treating children or adolescents is not seen as analogous to treating adults. People in the process of developing their bodies, minds and attitudes towards the world are very different from people who have already grown up. Opponents of this premise might look at the behavior of a preteen and compare it to someone in their twenties; it is very clear that the behaviors of the two people observed are usually not the same.
So a question that child psychiatry might ask is, “How do expressions of mental illness differ in children and adults?” Understanding this difference helps identify how symptoms of mental illness manifest in children. This in turn helps create diagnostic standards that can be used after assessment to give opinions on what mental disorders, if any, may exist.
Determining treatment after diagnosis raises a similar set of questions. Whether the treatment is some kind of therapy or medication, it should focus on how to cure children rather than adults. The same drug doses do not work, the same forms of therapy may not work, and new modalities must be explored to create the most effective treatments for children and adolescents. The extra years of specialization help child psychiatrists learn and exploit these modalities so that they are experts in diagnosing and treating the populations they serve.
It is common to think of people in child psychiatry as practicing only with individuals or families, but people in this field can work in many different areas. They can be employed in education in public or private schools, they can teach, they work with institutions that children occupy or they can do research, which is vital to acquire more knowledge in this field. Child psychiatrists may also participate in other areas, such as the forensic field, or they may be employed by child protection agencies as consultants or investigators.
The field also works closely with other specialists. Not all child psychiatrists give mental health advice, for example. However, they can recommend it to their patients and would work closely as part of a treatment team that included a therapist. Any form of pediatrics or pediatric specialty can also be part of a care team, especially when a child may have diverse mental, medical and physical needs.
Those interested in specializing in child psychiatry have a lot of training to complete. After four years, people spend four years in medical school and internship. They will complete three years of residency in general psychiatry and two more in child psychiatry. Sometimes residences are built in slightly different ways. Periodic continuing education is likely to be required to maintain board certification or licensure.
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