Child & Adolescent Psychiatry

About the Department

The Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry was established in 2012 at McMaster Children’s Hospital and Hamilton Health Sciences. The creation of the department followed a considerable expansion of the services available for child and youth mental health within the Hamilton area. Prior to 2008, the only child and youth mental health services available in our community were primarily outpatient services. Since that time there has been tremendous expansion of the child and youth mental health services at HHS.

Currently the Child and Youth Mental Health Program (CYMHP) at McMaster Children’s Hospital (MCH) provides care for children 0-17 years old. We are now one of the largest child and adolescent psychiatry programs in Ontario and Canada. CYMHP is a major provider of child and youth mental health service locally and regionally and serves patients from Local Health Integration Network (LHIN) 3 (Waterloo Wellington), LHIN 4 (Hamilton Niagara Haldimand Brant) and LHIN 6 Halton Health Services (Oakville, Milton, Georgetown). With the use of virtual appointments, the range of service provision has been extended.

We have a comprehensive range of services located on two sites including:

At McMaster Children’s Hospital:

• A 22-bed inpatient unit
• A Consultation-Liaison service providing consultation to pediatric inpatients
• An emergency service through McMaster Children’s Hospital emergency room (Mental Health Assessment Unit)

At Ron Joyce Children’s Health Centre

• A large outpatient service serving Hamilton and other regions
• A Brief Intervention Service
• A day hospital program
• A Community Education Service

Currently we have ~20 child psychiatrists and over 150 allied health staff including psychologists, social workers, nursing, child and youth workers.

Visit our McMaster University Department page.