We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Jennifer Jackson-Rice and Julie Gettings a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Jennifer and Julie thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Talk to us about building your team? What was it like? What were some of the key challenges and what was your process like?

Julie and Jennifer opened KC PCIT in June of 2020 with the goal of treating the mental health needs of families and children in a specialized center. Our vision has been to provide evidence based treatment models in the Kansas City metro and the surrounding communities through-out Kansas and Missouri. We strive to promptly connect with families and schedule appointments in a timely manner. With this goal we have expanded our practice in a mindful way.

Our specialty, Parent Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT), requires a therapist to have met a set of standards for competence before delivering the treatment model. This is a way to promote the effective dissemination of PCIT both nationally and internationally. In Kansas City there are a limited number of certified PCIT therapists as well as PCIT trainers. In March of 2021, we were fortunate to hire a level 1 PCIT trainer, allowing us to grow our practice. Without a trainer onsite, future employees would need to go out of state to be trained. Onsite training allows the trainer to be in the observation room with the trainee while the parent/child is in the playroom. The trainer is providing real-time coaching to the trainee as well as ongoing supervision.

PCIT requires two office spaces, an observation room and playroom with a 2-way viewing window in between. As we built our team, we needed to expand our space to have enough PCIT suites for our providers. In July of 2021, one year after opening, we added another PCIT suite, bringing it to three suites. Today, we are excited to have four certified PCIT providers and two therapists completing PCIT training and working towards certification in the next couple of months.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers?

KC PCIT is a private practice that provides therapy services to children and families. We specialize in offering evidence-based treatments to improve daily functioning of children, adolescents and their families. KC PCIT was formed in June of 2020, by Jennifer and Julie and has grown by six additional clinicians. All are experts in working with children, adolescents and their families with a wide array of diagnoses and challenges including attention/hyperactivity disorders, anxiety, adjustment disorders, post traumatic stress and family conflict. Our specialty is Parent Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT) is an evidence based treatment for children and their caregivers focused on decreasing externalized behaviors (tantrums, defiance, aggression, refusing to listen and follow directions), increasing social skills and compliance while improving the parent-child relationship. Children who participate in PCIT develop higher self-esteem, communication skills and cooperation, and caregivers learn consistent parenting techniques to gain confidence in dealing with behavioral struggles.
​PCIT is conducted through “coaching” sessions during which the caregiver and child are in a playroom while the therapist is in an observation room watching interactions through a one-way mirror. The caregiver wears a “bug-in-the-ear” device through which the therapist provides in-the-moment coaching on skills the caregiver is learning to manage the child’s behavior. Treatment protocol recommends weekly therapy sessions to ensure caregiver mastery of skills, improvement of child’s behavior and relationship enhancement.

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

We started our careers at Children’s Mercy Hospital, a place that thrives on top notch care for patients and families. Children’s Mercy holds their employees to a high standard of excellence, which was instilled in us early in our career. Under this umbrella, we received our Clinical Supervision and then our Clinical License in Social Work. During our training, it was emphasized that we provide evidence-based treatment models and to become specialized in an area of practice. This led us to get advanced training and certification in Parent Child Interaction Therapy as well as training in other evidence-based treatment models. We have carried this core value into our private practice and can say confidently say our clients receive treatments that have positive outcomes. In addition, our practice specializes in treatment for disruptive behaviors, anxiety, ADHD and trauma.

As KC PCIT grows, our focus has been on hiring providers who’ve been trained with the same lense, and also believe in using evidence based models. As a team we meet weekly for consultation and supervision. We remain current on the latest research, treatment adaptation and trainings.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

For years, we discussed the options of forming our own specialist center for children and families. Over the past 7 years we strategically began creating a business plan, but were unclear when we would actually activate it. We also made two career decisions that were stepping stones to our final goal, which became reality a month after the start of the pandemic. In four short weeks we created KC PCIT, found an office space and had our website up and running. During June of 2020 we began seeing clients through tele-health and then in July of 2020 our office space was completed. Our business grew in demand which led us to hire 6 additional clinicians to become a part of our team.

Contact Info:

• Website: kcpcit.com
• Instagram: @KCPCIT
• Facebook: @KCPCIT