Dear Readers and Parents: I wanted to inform you that I was in New York last month for an Intense Training in Parent-Child-Interaction Therapy, PCIT. Dr. Melanie Fernandez, from the Child Mind Institute, provided the training for four psychologists. PCIT is an empirically-based therapy that focuses on the interaction of parents and children who show disruptive behaviors, ADHD, and other conditions. This therapy was designed for children between the ages of 2 and 7, and the program was initially developed at the University of Florida, and how it has been growing and being taught and applied in many other University and treatment centers around the U.S. and the world. The focus on therapy is in helping parents in their interaction with their children with the goal of diminishing and eliminating inappropriate behaviors, as they help in increasing the appropriate ones. Therapy usually lasts about 17 weeks, and parents have a very active role during the therapy process, including with homework assignments. Please, look at the ABC News report from New York, when Dr. Melanie Fernandez, the Director of PCIT at the Child Mind Institute, gave an interview about PCIT. If you would like to learn more about this type of therapy, please, do not hesitate to call our office as well. 

http://newyork.cbslocal.com/category/video-on-demand-news/?autoStart=true&topVideoCatNo=default&clipId=6005444#.Th5VhMhNOEN.email