Mental Health Care in Cherry Hill, NJ: A Local Guide

If anyone is in immediate danger, call 911. For thoughts of suicide or a mental health crisis, call or text 988, any hour. Camden County's crisis screening line, run by Oaks Integrated Care, is 856-428-4357 (856-428-HELP), 24 hours a day. More numbers are on our crisis page.

Cherry Hill has something most towns do not. Camden County's crisis system is physically here. The county's walk-in mental health urgent care sits on Springdale Road, and the designated crisis screening service lists its location inside a Cherry Hill hospital. If you live in town, the help that most Camden County residents have to drive to is a few minutes away.

The two services do different jobs, and knowing which one you need is most of what decides where you go on a bad night. This guide starts with that difference, then covers ongoing therapy, kids and teens, and support for families. Programs elsewhere in the county, including the low-cost health centers in Camden City, are on our Camden County resource page.

A bad day that is not an emergency

Most people in distress are not in danger. They are overwhelmed, not sleeping, panicking, or scared of where their thoughts are going. A hospital emergency room is a hard place to be in that state, and the wait can be long.

Oaks Integrated Care runs a Mental Health Urgent Care at 2051 Springdale Road, Cherry Hill, phone 856-254-3800. It is for adults 18 and older in Camden County who need help now but do not need to be hospitalized. Oaks tells people to call or visit urgent care first, before going to a screening center or an ER.

What to know before you go:

• Hours: Monday to Friday, 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Oaks takes walk-ins during those hours and offers telehealth in the same hours. It is closed Sundays.
• What happens: a staff member meets with you soon after you arrive and works out a plan with you. Options include counseling, peer support, a psychiatric consultation, medication, and skill-building groups.
• How long: you can keep working with the team for up to 30 days while they connect you to longer-term care.
• Paying: self-pay, private insurance, Medicaid, and a sliding scale based on income.

After hours, Oaks directs people to 856-428-HELP or 911.

When it is a psychiatric emergency

If anyone is in immediate danger, call 911. If someone may be a danger to themselves or others but is not in immediate danger, or is too unwell to stay safe at home, that is a job for crisis screening.

Oaks is Camden County's designated crisis screening center. Oaks says it serves adults and youth in a psychiatric emergency 24/7, 365 days a year. Oaks' locations page lists the service as Crisis Screening at Jefferson Cherry Hill Hospital, 2201 Chapel Avenue.

Call 856-428-4357 before you go. Oaks asks for that call, and it is also the answer when you cannot tell whether this is an urgent care night or a screening night: staff can tell you whether to come in, where, or whether someone should come to you. Oaks also runs Adult Mobile Outreach in Camden County, which family members, friends, or employers can request for an adult whose symptoms are getting worse and who will not or cannot come in.

Virtua says the emergency rooms at all of its hospitals, including Virtua Voorhees Hospital, offer 24/7 emergency psychiatric care.

If there is a weapon, a medical emergency, or an overdose, skip all of this and call 911.

Ongoing therapy and psychiatry

Crisis care is short by design. Weekly therapy and medication management come from somewhere else, and in Cherry Hill that usually means one of three intake routes or a private therapist.

Oaks Integrated Care, outpatient offices in Cherry Hill. Beyond urgent care and screening, Oaks lists offices at 19 East Ormond Avenue (856-428-1300) and 1409 North Kings Highway (856-482-8747). Its outpatient program offers counseling for children, adults, and families, co-occurring mental health and substance use treatment, and medication management. Oaks takes Medicaid, Medicare, some private insurance, and self-pay on a sliding scale. Outpatient hours run Monday to Friday, 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., with some weekend availability. To start, call the Oaks Access Center at 1-800-963-3377, Monday to Friday, 9 a.m. to 8 p.m.

Center for Family Services. This South Jersey nonprofit runs outpatient behavioral health for children, teens, adults, couples, and families. Its Camden County sites are in Voorhees and Camden City. All intake goes through one line, the ACCESS Department, at 1-877-922-2377. That same call covers which insurance it accepts and which location fits you.

Virtua, if you already have a Virtua primary care doctor. Virtua places licensed clinical social workers inside its primary care practices. If you are a Virtua Primary Care patient, your doctor can refer you for short-term therapy, in person or by video. Virtua says you can also call 888-847-8823 to connect with its behavioral health team. It does not offer that therapy track to people outside its primary care network.

Private therapists are the other large group in town. Our guide to finding a therapist in Camden County explains how to check a license and ask about fees before the first visit. If cost is the obstacle, read therapy without insurance.

Kids and teens

Start at school. Cherry Hill Public Schools publishes how its mental health services work. The district lists school counselors for academic, emotional and social support. Student Assistance Counselors handle intervention, prevention, referral, and crisis response. High schoolers in grades 9 to 12 can take a universal mental health screening through BH-Works, but only with parent consent. Students can also report safety concerns anonymously through the STOPit app.

If your child talks about suicide at school, expect the district to call you. Under the district's suicide prevention policy, the principal contacts you right away and refers your child to the Child Study Team or a Suicide Intervention Team for a preliminary assessment, then meets with you to review it. If your child is required to get medical or psychiatric care, the district needs written clearance from a licensed medical professional, chosen by you and approved by the superintendent, before your child returns. The policy says the district will not make you pay for that psychiatric clearance. Ask your child's counselor who handles these steps at your child's school, so you are not learning them on the day it happens.

For a crisis at home that is not life-threatening, call PerformCare at 1-877-652-7624, any hour. In Camden County, Oaks runs Children's Mobile Response for ages 5 to 21. It sends a trained professional to your home, usually the same day, for problems like suicidal thoughts, self-harm that does not need emergency care, school refusal, or oppositional or defiant behavior. Short-term stabilization can follow for up to eight weeks.

For structured programs, Virtua's CASTLE program in Camden offers full-day partial hospitalization for ages 5 to 14, after-school intensive outpatient for ages 5 to 13, and outpatient care that Virtua's Camden page lists for ages 3 to 25. Virtua's own pages give different age limits, so a young adult should confirm eligibility on the intake call, 856-246-3013. Details are on our Camden County page. Our parent's guide covers warning signs and how to raise the subject with your child.

For families and peers

NAMI Camden County is based at 1409 N. Kings Highway in Cherry Hill. Its groups currently meet online by Zoom. A Family Support Group meets the second Thursday of each month at 7 p.m. A Connection group for adults living with a mental health condition meets the first Thursday at 7 p.m. Both ask you to register by noon on the day of the group, through the chapter's website.

If someone you love is struggling and refuses help, read when someone you love won't get help. For an adult whose symptoms are getting worse, Oaks' Adult Mobile Outreach, described above, is one of the few services a family member can request on that person's behalf.

Cherry Hill crisis and urgent care numbers

For immediate danger, a weapon, or an overdose, the number is 911. The rest, in the order this guide uses them:

• 988, the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, call or text, any hour.
• 856-428-4357, Camden County crisis screening (Oaks), 24 hours. Call before going in.
• 856-254-3800, Oaks Mental Health Urgent Care on Springdale Road, for adults who need help today but are not in danger.
• 1-877-652-7624, PerformCare, for a child or teen in crisis at home, any hour.

If you start at urgent care, ask at the first visit which ongoing program they plan to connect you to. Thirty days is not long, and every ongoing-care route above starts with an intake call or a referral rather than a walk-in.