Health Services

The Children’s Aid Society has long focused on the health needs of underserved New York City children and families. Since 1853, the agency has provided a wide range of health services in a variety of settings.

Today children and families in Harlem, Washington Heights and the Bronx can access health care in school at one of Children’s Aid’s five school-based health sites or in their community at three community center-based health care facilities. The Children’s Aid Society has forged professional collaborations with such world-renowned institutions as Mount Sinai Medical Center, New York-Presbyterian and Montefiore Medical Center.

The Children’s Aid Society offers a wide range of medical services including preventive examinations and immunizations, optometry, hearing tests, HIV/AIDS testing and counseling, women’s reproductive health and education, prenatal care, well-baby care, early childhood obesity prevention and asthma prevention and management.

A mobile dental van, developed in partnership with the Columbia University School of Dental and Oral Surgery, features two dental chairs and offers much-needed care to children throughout New York City. Dentists provide cleanings, fluoride treatments and fillings, and also teach their young patients good oral hygiene.
The stresses of poverty, demands of childhood, confusion inherent to adolescence and surrounding environmental influences create complex emotional struggles and mental health issues for children and their parents. The Children’s Aid Society’s mental health services aim to alleviate these stresses. A team of psychiatrists and social workers respond to the needs of children through crisis intervention, short- and long-term therapy, group work and family counseling.

A lack of medical insurance can be a major stumbling block to obtaining necessary medical care. The Children’s Aid Society established its Health Care Access Program (HCAP) in 1998 to help children and families overcome logistical and language barriers in order to successfully enroll in New York’s two principal government-sponsored health insurance programs, Medicaid and Child Health Plus.

The Children’s Aid Society was founded in 1853. It is one of the nation’s largest and most innovative non-sectarian agencies, serving over 150,000 of New York’s neediest children and their families with a network of services that includes community schools, neighborhood centers, camps, adoption and foster care services, teen pregnancy prevention, education, health and recreation. For additional information please call 212-949-4938 or visit www.childrensaidsociety.org.