From start-up in 1973 to 1999, Dr. Harrison-Ross was at the helm of the Metropolitan Hospital Community Mental Health Center as its Director and Chief of Psychiatry. In addition she was the Associate Medical Director of Metropolitan Hospital and President of the Medical Board. She led a multi-disciplinary staff of over 600. This municipal Psychiatric Center serves a population of 1 million persons in the Midtown, Upper East Side and Harlem areas of Manhattan and provides adult and child mental health services in in-patient, ambulatory, clinic, and community settings. Additional programs under her jurisdiction included Drug, Alcoholism and AIDS Treatment; Psychiatric Community Support Services; Education and Consultation Services for Police, Court and Prison personnel; and multiculturally focused Medical Education, Training and Research. She oversaw the transition from a traditional fee-for-service hospital based program to a managed care ready program. Since 9/11, 2001, she has immersed herself in interfaith disaster mental health services and currently serves as president of All Healers Mental Health Alliance and Trustee and Chairperson of the Social Service Board of the New York Society for Ethical Culture.

As an outgrowth of her directorship responsibilities, in 1975, she helped form the New York City Federation of Mental Health, Mental Retardation and Alcoholism Services whose mission was to plan and develop a range of citywide policies and programs for populations at high risk. Within this umbrella organization, Dr. Harrison-Ross held various roles as Citywide Chairperson; Chairperson of NYC Directors of Psychiatry in Municipal Hospitals (1986-1992); Chairperson of Minority Advisory Committee of NYS Office of Mental Health (1979-1988) and since 1993 is an Honorary Academic Advisor of NYS Alliance for Mentally Ill.

As former Psychiatric Director of the Therapeutic Nursery School/Children's Evaluation and Rehabilitation Clinic at Rose F. Kennedy Center for Mental Retardation & Human Development (Albert Einstein College of Medicine), she pioneered rehabilitative and therapeutic programs which enabled children with severe physical, emotional and developmental disabilities to be mainstreamed into public school classes. The positive results of her work came to the attention of State officials, thus launching her career in public service. In 1968 she was commissioned to implement educational projects similar to her pilot program on a Statewide basis and was also appointed by Governor Rockefeller to the NYS Fleischmann Commission to study Quality, Cost and Financing of Primary and Secondary Education, especially programs for Children with Special Needs. At about the same time President Nixon appointed her to the President's Advisory Council on Drug Abuse Prevention where she helped set national policy.

From there on consulting positions abounded. She was a Consultant to the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) regarding Community Disaster Assessment and Treatment following the murders of Black children in Atlanta, Georgia.

More than 10 years and several public advisory commission positions later, Dr. Phyllis Harrison-Ross, once again was summoned to the NIMH when, in 1987, she was among three nationwide Finalists recommended to President Regan for the position of Director by the nationally convened search committee.

In 1976, Dr. Harrison-Ross was appointed by Governor Rockefeller to serve as a Forensic Psychiatrist on the Medical Review Board of the New York State Commission of Corrections. She was re-appointed by subsequent Governors, most recently (2004)by Governor George Pataki and continues her work with the MRB today, tracking/trending medical issues and causes of deaths, making recommendations for improving the delivery of health care to confined, pre-trial detainees and sentenced offenders, and developing training programs and initiatives for correctional officials and prison health care providers. The MRB is also responsible for following through on complaints and grievances relating to health care in the prison system; monitoring and studying the demographics of AIDS and mental illnesses in the New York prisons; and advocating for and developing new programs and minimum health standards in the system. She has written several textbook chapters and articles on prison health, most recently regarding the fastest growing and most inadequately treated incarcerated group, i.e. women prisoners.

Of the numerous public educational and teaching projects Dr. Phyllis Harrison-Ross has been involved in, she is perhaps proudest of her role as Principal Investigator for MERTI (Multicultural Education, Research and Training Institute of the New York Medical College at Metropolitan Hospital Center. Funded by the NYS Office of Mental Health, the institute, under her direction, published articles, monographs, literature searches and training videos and provided training programs statewide and nationally. No stranger to the Media, Dr. Harrison-Ross, was Moderator of her own parent-education television series "All About Parents" in the early 1970s. Currently, she co-hosts a radio talk show, "Ethics on the Air". She was also Executive Producer of a TV/Crosswalks program called "The Delivery of Mental Health Services in the General Health Care Sector." She also authored two books: "The Black Child" (1978) and "Getting it Together" (1973).

The recipient of numerous awards and citations, she is a Life Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, is a former president of the Black Psychiatrists of America, and also served as an elected member of the Governing Council of the American Hospital Association until 1998.

She received the American Psychiatric Association's Solomon Carter Fuller Award for distinguished service to improve the lives of Black people in 2004. The All Healers Mental Health Alliance received an award for Public Health Leadership at the American Public Health Association annual meetings in Washington, D.C. in November 2007 for work AHMHA has done to bring hope and healing to disaster survivors following the World Trade Center 9/11, Katrina and Rita hurricane disasters including the integrating of the use of various telehealth solutions into the recovery strategies.

Dr. Harrison-Ross is Emeritus Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Health Services at the New York Medical College having previously held academic positions at Columbia University School of Social Work, Albert Einstein School of Medicine, and Cornell Medical College. She has also served on the Boards of Children's Television Workshop (Producers of Sesame Street, etc.), Dance Theatre of Harlem, Caraco Pharmaceuticals, Ltd. and currently, in addition to the NYS Commission of Corrections Medical Review Board, the Editorial Board of the New York Amsterdam News, Medical Health and Research Association of New York, New York Society for Ethical Culture, Northside Center for Child Development and the Academic Board of the Scattergood Center for Bioethics in Behavioral Health Care. She also finds time for a private practice in psychiatry.

Websites:   www.harrison-ross.yourmd.com;   www.ahmha.org;   www.nysec.org;   www.bpgny.com