This is the second of a series of articles to inform the membership of the various liaison activities of our Association with other organizations.
The American Academy of Child Psychiatry (AACP) was founded in 1953 and has counted among its presidents numerous psychoanalysts, including E. fames Anthony, M.D., its current president. From its beginning, the Academy has maintained a strong commitment to furthering the mental health of children, adolescents, and their families.
An Assembly of Regional Organizations, a network of state and local councils of child psychiatry, monitors child mental health care at the grassroots level. The AACP has founded and supports the National Consortium for Child Mental Health Services, which consists of 19 professional, provider, and consumer organizations that meet four times a year in Washington, D.C. to act upon national child mental health issues and to develop policy to improve services.
It has taken a leadership role in the creation of standards for children's psychiatric services for the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Hospitals (JCAH), the development of criteria for peer review, and advocacy on behalf of children through amicus statements in cases before the Supreme Court and district courts. A vigorous national continuing medical education program on child mental health care has been pursued, including an annual meeting held each October, institutes on a wide range of important topics, an annual child psychiatry review course, and the publication of a bimonthly Journal and a quarterly Newsletter. Moreover, it administers a committee structure that involves its 2816 members in a wide range of professional activities that characterize child psychiatry today.
The Journal of the American Academy of Child Psychiatry (JAACP), started in 1962, has always had a large number of psychoanalysts on its Editorial Board, including its present Editor, Melvin Lewis, M.D. Of particular immediate interest to psychoanalysts is the Special Section on Child Analysis, Guest Editor E. James Anthony, M.D., now being prepared for the JAACP. Psychoanalysts will also be excited by the wealth of research data on child development and child psychopathology now available, both in the presentations at scientific programs of the AACP and in the scientific papers published in the JAACP.
I am particularly pleased that the American wishes to maintain its liaison with the AACP, and I am confident this alliance will continue to flourish. My hope is that the liaison between the American and the Academy will be further encouraged through joint workshops, panels or papers at the scientific meetings of both organizations, and through publication of relevant scientific papers in our respective journals.
Melvin Lewis, M.D.
Liaison between APsaA & AACP