Intensive Outpatient Program
While Akron Children’s Hospital continues to make every effort to ensure the safety of our patients, families, and staff during the COVID-19 pandemic, please be aware we will be phone screening all patients with upcoming appointments for COVID-19. The legal guardian of those patients will receive a phone screening. Screening questions are tools designed to prevent the spread of infection and keep people safe. Parents and guardians should accompany patients to the front entrance screening area.
Overview
Akron Children’s Division of Pediatric Psychiatry and Psychology offers inpatient and outpatient treatment for teens experiencing psychiatric symptoms. In addition to our inpatient unit, we offer 2 levels of intensive mental health treatment in an outpatient setting for teens whose symptoms are severe enough to warrant additional services beyond traditional therapy.
Program Benefits
Intensive Outpatient Program (IOP) focuses on short- term stabilization to help at-risk teens improve functioning, develop healthy coping skills and stabilize mood.
Our multidisciplinary team includes licensed mental health therapists, psychiatrists and psychiatric nurses. Our program uses evidence-based therapy and skill-training exercises to increase self- awareness of thoughts, feelings and behaviors, enabling teens to make healthier choices. Family education and therapy are also essential parts of our program.
Our Doctors/Providers
Rihab Mohamed, MD
Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist; Medical Director, Partial Hospitalization Program
Kathy Royer, MSN, APRN-CNS
Psychiatric Clinical Nurse Specialist
Brooks Collins-Gaines, LPC, ECMHC, CTP-C
Mental Health Therapist
Kendra Crookston, LPCC-S
Mental Health Therapist
Terri Leslie, MSSA, LISW-S
Mental Health Therapist
Megan Ott, LPCC-S
Clinical Operations Supervisor, Mental Health Therapist
Videos
What Should Families Expect When They Come for an Appointment?
At Akron Children’s, your child’s health and safety is our priority. Please continue to bring your child for wellness visits, vaccinations or sick care appointments that keep children healthy. We want to assure you that we have taken additional precautions to ensure a safe environment for your child and family. The following are additional safety efforts, in addition to our normal cleaning protocols, that we are taking to help you be comfortable bringing your child to an appointment.
Limiting the Number of Caregivers and Face Covering
The number of caregivers permitted to accompany a child to an appointment is dependent on the department you are visiting. Everyone visiting an Akron Children's facility is asked to wear masks or face coverings, except for kids under 2 or those with sensory issues. Masks will be provided for visitors who do not bring their own.
Checking In and Screening of Visitors
Akron Children's now offers Mobile Check-in to limit your exposure to others. You'll receive a text an hour before your child's appointment arrival time. Click the link in the text when you reach the Akron Children's facility for your child's appointment. You will receive a confirmation text that reminds you to wait in your car. Once we determine appropriate spacing is available inside the building, you'll receive a third text to let you know it's OK to come in for your appointment.
Immediately upon entering the building, your temperature will be taken, either by a thermal scanner or a greeter who will also ask you a few questions.
If you are in a waiting room, you’ll notice signs and a limited number of chairs. This is to remind our patients to keep 6 feet of physical distance between your family and others.
Precautions If You Suspect Your Child Has COVID-19
Call your child’s healthcare professional if your child is sick with fever, cough, or difficulty breathing and has been in close contact with a person known to have COVID-19, or if you live in or have recently traveled from an area with ongoing spread of COVID-19. Your health care professional will work with Ohio’s public health department and the CDC to determine if your child needs to be tested for COVID-19.
View all the safety precautions Akron Children's is taking.
Eligibility Criteria
- Teens must be between ages 12-18 and still in school.
- Teens and parents/legal guardians must seek treatment voluntarily.
- Parents/legal guardians must agree to participate in their teen’s individual treatment plan.
- Teens must be committed to safety for themselves and others while in the program.
- Teens must participate in all program sessions and cannot choose to attend only certain sessions, such as individual psychiatric services.
- PHP and IOP are not for teens with a primary diagnosis of eating disorders, substance abuse disorders or significant behavior disorders.
Contact Us
After-Hours Crisis
If you feel your teen is in immediate crisis and out of control, we encourage you to call 911.
If your teen is in crisis and at risk of harming himself or others but is not out of control, you can call Akron Children’s Psychiatric Intake Response Center (PIRC) at 330-543-7472 or bring your child to the Akron Children’s ER.
PIRC offers round-the-clock mental health assessments by phone and may direct families to the ER for evaluation. Akron Children’s has a Behavioral Health ER unit dedicated to patients with emotional and behavioral health issues that is equipped with a calming, secure environment and staff trained to de-escalate behavior, and stabilize and assess patients in crisis.
