Psychiatric Disorder in a Juvenile Assessment Center

Juvenile assessment centers (JACs) were developed to address service fragmentation and promote the sharing of information among agencies providing services to youth involved with the juvenile justice system. To date, there are no reports that describe the diagnostic profiles of the youth served by such centers. The authors hypothesize that the rates of psychiatric disorder among youth at JAC intake would be lower than rates reported for youth in secure care, that girls would show higher rates of some disorders, and that those with substance disorders would show higher rates of other, co-occurring disorders. Disorder was measured on the Voice Diagnostic Interview Schedule for Children in 1,012 randomly selected youth (248 girls). Rates of disorder for JAC youth are lower than those reported for incarcerated samples and more comparable to other general intake samples; JAC youth's diagnostic profiles remain elevated compared to youth in the general population, and girls report higher rates of disorder in three of four diagnostic clusters examined. Clinical and policy implications are discussed.