It is essential that child and adolescent psychiatrists are able to interact with families in a productive way, promoting healthy interactions within the family, with the child, and among family members. At times, family concerns and difficulties may impede the child's success, negatively affecting response to treatment or actually amplifying the child's problems. This Special Interest Study Group reviews useful family interventions, discusses integrating family interventions with other mental health treatments, and looks at methods of supporting family strengths and encouraging family treatment. Participants discuss problems they encounter working with families and share common difficult family scenarios, such as high conflict divorce, parent with mental illness and/or substance abuse, cultural differences within families and/or between families and clinicians, and significant parent-child conflict.