Separating Immigrant Children from Their Parents:
How to Help in NYC

The New York County Psychiatric Society, in agreement with the American Psychiatric Association, American Medical Association, American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, American Academy of Pediatrics, and the medical community, notes with sadness and alarm the current immigration crisis and the government policy separating children from their parents. This violates all known mental health knowledge and humanitarian principles. It inflicts abandonment trauma on the young children who have become the innocent victims of this policy.

As we have learned, many of the affected children have been moved to the NYC area. We are actively reaching out to receiving organizations to look for ways to help meet these children's mental health needs and we will continue to update our website for ways you can help.

Of course, as psychiatrists we know that the best and most effective help is to reunite these children with their parents as quickly as possible! We call on all of our elected officials to bring about the reunion of these families.

Ways to Help

• Catholic Charities has informed NYCPS that they are currently seeking a Spanish-speaking volunteer Child Psychiatrist to assist with assessments of displaced children in Hudson Valley. Email [email protected] for more information. They are also accepting in-kind donations of new toys, strollers, backpacks, and school supplies. To donate, contact Margaret Rodriguez at (212) 371-1011, ext. 2301 or [email protected]. NYCPS is in continued talks with them about when/where mental health assessments might be needed.
• Cayuga Centers, one of the organizations receiving foster children, has set up a Wish List of items they still need to help with their program. (Please check the list first- as they are no longer in need of clothing, diapers, or food.) Download their letter and read more details about their wish list information here.

NYCPS will keep you informed about volunteer and pro bono opportunities to assist these children and families. We will continue to update our website www.nycpsych.org with information as it becomes available.

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Who We Are 

Since its formation in 1955, the New York County Psychiatric Society, a District Branch of the American Psychiatric Association, has striven to be a resource for both psychiatrists and the public. NYCPS is composed of over 1,800 psychiatrists in Manhattan and Staten Island, and is the largest district branch of the APA.

We promote the common professional interests of our members, while working to improve the treatment, rehabilitation, and care of persons with mental disorders, and to advance the standards of all psychiatric services and facilities. NYCPS also aims to promote research, foster cooperation between those involved with the medical, psychological, social, and legal aspects of mental health and illness, and to make psychiatric knowledge available to practitioners of medicine, scientists, and the public.