Children’s Crisis Treatment Center (CcTC): Bringing Mental and Behavioral Health Care to Hard-to-Reach Populations

Abstract

Summary

Communities face significant challenges in accessing effective mental and behavioral health treatment for children who have experienced trauma and consequently suffer from mental health issues.  These challenges are compounded when the children belong to immigrant, minority, and/or refugee groups that live in low-income areas.  Children’s Crisis Treatment Center (CcTC) has developed a model of care that helps meet the needs of these vulnerable children in Philadelphia’s immigrant, minority, and refugee communities by providing high-quality, comprehensive mental and behavioral health services through community integration.

In the last ten years, under the innovative leadership of Antonio (Tony) Valdés, CcTC has grown and become culturally relevant to each ethnic group the organization serves.  CcTC’s unique approach has been formalized in its “Nine Essential Components for Success” in community integration, which include immersing in, interacting with, and soliciting feedback from the target community. Securing organizational buy-in, providing multidimensional services, and hiring staff from the target community are also essential.  CcTC integrates itself by establishing programs in key geographic locations, creating high visibility, and collaborating with existing community organizations.  The individual strategies are not revolutionary, but CcTC combines them in a way that has given the organization unique access to underserved minority, immigrant, and refugee communities in Philadelphia. CcTC is now viewed as almost indigenous to its client base, and it provides vital mental and behavioral health services to these underserved clients who might otherwise slip through the cracks of the mainstream health and mental health care systems.

CcTC’s successful community integration allows it to effectively serve children all over the city, including those who reside in a West African immigrant and refugee community in Southwest Philadelphia.  In this neighborhood, children grapple with serious acculturation issues while suffering the longstanding effects of war-related traumas experienced in their home countries.

Antonio (Tony) Valdés has been the Executive Director of Children’s Crisis Treatment Center in Philadelphia since 1997. He has been a leader in mental health services for more than 20 years, and is an advocate for the needs of Philadelphia’s children’s mental and behavioral health services provider community.  He was previously the Director of Operations for Connections CSP in Delaware, and the Executive Director of the Child Psychiatry Center in North Philadelphia.  Under Tony’s leadership, CcTC has expanded sevenfold in number of employees, annual budget, and programming.  Tony serves as the Board President of the Council of Spanish Speaking Organizations, Inc., and is a member of the Board of Directors of the Philadelphia Alliance (and former President of the Board), Casa Dominicana, and  Consejos Consultivos de la Presidencia de los Dominicanos en el Exterior in the Delaware Valley.  Tony received his MBA in Health and Medical Services Administration from Widener University and lives in Wilmington, Delaware. He has two children: Andrew and Ana.