Introduction to Adolescent Public Mental Health

The premise of this volume is that the value of healthy adolescent development is critical for the near-term future of the population. As such, like other critical periods of development, adolescence deserves focused specialty care and nurturance that does not currently exist. Further, the current system of adolescent mental health (AMH) care has been under siege for some time and crippled by the recent pandemic. Addressing these seemingly intractable problems through the lens of implementation science broadens the view to the level of systems change using validated tools to address the multilevel nature of the problems. Together with system-level procedures such as a collective impact framework and the use of a theory of change approach, a sea change is possible with sustainable system-level programs established across a wide array of social and health-related problems. Leveraging empirical evidence and firsthand experience implementing an adolescent public mental health program in Houston, Texas, this volume provides a rationale and a map of the territory of adolescent public mental health (APMH).