The future of child psychiatry as a medical discipline

There is a shortage of child psychiatrists; at the same time, efforts to establish comprehensive care health resources for families and children are increasing. To ensure that child psychiatry keeps pace with broader changes in medical care, the author recommends that the distribution and practices of child psychiatrists be examined and that the therapies used be evaluated. The structural relationships of child psychiatry remaining programs to medical school departments of psychiatry and pediatrics and to the specialty examining boards also need reappraisal. Discussion of these issues within and outside child psychiatry should be stimulating and useful to the field's future.