Helping our patients with “Estrés, nervios, depresión y miedo” during COVID19 – Luke Smith, MD

Helping our patients with “Estrés, nervios, depresión y miedo” during COVID19 

Luke Smith, MD

Luke Smith, M.D. is the executive director of El Futuro, a nonprofit behavioral health agency offering outpatient services to the Latino population in the Piedmont region of North Carolina. He is a practicing Spanish-bilingual psychiatrist who is boarded in child/adolescent and general psychiatry. In 2004, he led the creation of El Futuro in order to address the unmet need of bringing accessible behavioral health services to the growing Latino community in North Carolina. With steady growth and innovative funding approaches, El Futuro now serves approximately 1,700 individuals from 20 counties each year. He leads a staff of 44 people, with a comprehensive suite of licensed behavioral health providers trained in culturally-responsive, trauma-informed, and healing-engaged treatment approaches targeted to the Latino immigrant community.

Additionally, Dr. Smith initiated the NC Latino Mental Health Provider Network (La Mesita) in 2017 to facilitate sharing culturally-responsive treatment practices and improving Latino mental health across North Carolina. This Network now has over 800 participating members, hosts monthly webinars, targeted Learning Cohorts, and is an ECHO tele-case consultation replication partner site. Under Dr. Smith’s watch, El Futuro has maintained a careful focus on patient engagement and participated in successful multi-year community based projects funded by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) and Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI).