2026 Psych Services Awards

For more than 75 years, the Psychiatric Services Achievement Awards have recognized creative models of service delivery and innovative programs for people with mental illness or disabilities. The 2026 awardees include, who will be recognized this morning at the Annual Meeting, include a program leveraging telepsychiatry to increase care access to underserved youth in North Carolina, a new model of intensive community-based care being rolled out in Pennsylvania, and a San Francisco organization that provides mental health and wellness services that are centered around community and culture.

GOLD AWARD

Caring for the Mental Health and Wellbeing of Children: Using Telepsychiatry and other Health Technologies to Enhance Access to Care and Promote Well-Being
“Caring for the Mental Health and Wellbeing of Children” is a new initiative within the North Carolina Statewide Telepsychiatry Program (NC-STEP), which is run by East Carolina University in partnership with United Health Group. This new component will expand NC-STEP into six community-based pediatric clinics in underserved parts of the state (Tier 1 and Tier 2 counties) to support the mental health care of underserved youth. In addition, behavioral health providers will be embedded within the clinics to serve as a conduit between the patients and psychiatrists.

SILVER AWARD

Community Based Intensive Treatment (CBIT) at Nulton Diagnostic and Treatment Center
The CBIT program at Nulton Diagnostic and Treatment Center is a multidisciplinary, community-integrated behavioral health model that serves high-acuity individuals at 14 locations across Pennsylvania. The CBIT program will deliver fast-tracked psychiatric care, wraparound support services, and real-time care coordination to individuals with serious mental illness—without requiring new licensure or specialty programs like assertive community treatment. The CBIT model will leverage existing “in-plan” Medicaid services—such as nursing care, case management, and outpatient therapy—arranged into an intensive, time-limited framework.

BRONZE AWARD

Richmond Area Multi-Services (RAMS)
RAMS is a nonprofit mental health organization in San Francisco and Alameda counties that is committed to advocating for and providing comprehensive services (e.g., health, social, and vocational) that are community-based, culturally competent, and consumer-guided. A core component of RAMS is its dedicated team of more than 100 peer specialists/providers who serve San Franciscans with mental health and substance use disorders—including counselors who work with street-based crisis-response teams as an alternative approach to law enforcement. RAMS also runs a peer certificate program to train the next generation of peer counselors.

The 2026 Psychiatric Services Service Award selection committee included Gerard Gallucci, M.D., Laura Halpin, M.D., Ph.D., Jules Ranz, M.D., and Sasidhar Gunturu, M.D. ■