Cerritos, California
Psychiatric Care for Cerritos
Two freeways and about twenty-three minutes — psychiatric evaluation and medication management for Cerritos, in person in Long Beach or by secure video.
In short
Psychiatric care for Cerritos
Cerritos sits roughly fourteen miles from our office, a little over twenty minutes by way of the 605 and the 405. We provide psychiatric evaluation, diagnosis and ongoing medication management. Nearly four in five working-age residents here hold commercial insurance, so for most people reading this the plan in your wallet is one we already contract with.
- Our office
- 3646 Long Beach Blvd # 205, Long Beach, CA 90807
- Hours
- Mon–Fri · 8 AM–6 PM (Pacific)
- Phone
- (818) 286-3862
Telehealth available across California, with new locations coming to Northern California.
What we do
Psychiatric care for Cerritos patients
We are a psychiatric practice, not a therapy group and not a clinic directory. That means diagnosis, medication, and someone who keeps track of how you are actually doing over time.
Psychiatry Services
Comprehensive psychiatric care — diagnosis, treatment planning, and ongoing management led by a board-certified provider.
Medication Management
Careful prescribing, monitoring, and adjustment of psychiatric medications to maximize benefit and minimize side effects.
Psychiatric Evaluation
A thorough first assessment to understand your history and symptoms and build an accurate diagnosis and plan.
What a first visit looks like
A full psychiatric evaluation runs about an hour. We go through what brought you in, your history, what you have tried before and how it went, physical health and medications, and what you want to be different. You leave with a working diagnosis where one is clear, a plan, and a follow-up booked — not a referral to somewhere else.
Follow-ups are shorter, usually every few weeks at first and further apart once things are steady. Medication changes are made deliberately, one at a time, so it stays possible to tell what is working.
In person or by video, from Cerritos
Both are real options and the clinical care is the same. Video visits are secure and available anywhere in California, which for most people makes the first appointment in person and the routine follow-ups from home or on a work break.
If getting here is the thing standing between you and treatment, take the video visit rather than skipping the care. That is what it is for.
Care is provided by our psychiatric team — Irine Achuamang, MSN, PMHNP-BC and Austina Cho, MD.
Paying for care
The short insurance conversation
Usually, yes. We are in network with 19 commercial carriers, including Aetna, Anthem, Beacon Health Options, Carelon, Cigna and others — you can check your own plan below before booking anything. That list includes TRICARE and TriWest, so service members, veterans and military families are billed like anyone else here.
We do not currently take Medi-Cal managed care. If that is your coverage, we are a self-pay option rather than a covered visit, and it is better to know that now than at the front desk. Self-pay is $250 for a 60-minute initial psychiatric evaluation and $150 for a 30-minute follow-up visit, and there is a sliding scale — please ask.
What that looks like in Cerritos
Local coverage data, so you can see roughly where you fall before you call:
- Among Cerritos adults aged 19 to 64, 78.3 percent hold commercial insurance, employer plans plus those bought directly. The same measure is 44.3 percent in Compton and 36.0 percent in Huntington Park. source
- In the same age band only 9.3 percent of Cerritos residents rely on Medi-Cal or another means-tested public program, and 4.7 percent are uninsured. In Huntington Park, twelve miles away, 24.3 percent are uninsured. source
- Cerritos has a population of 47,867 and a median household income of $135,439. source
- Cerritos counts about 1,256 veterans, 3.2 percent of its civilian adults. source
In-network with your insurance
We're in-network with most major plans, so care stays affordable. Not sure about yours? Verify your coverage in about a minute — or we'll gladly check it for you.
No card to hand? Just leave your name and number — tick “look it up for me” and we'll do the checking. Self-pay & sliding-scale options are also available.
Plans we accept
Paying out of pocket?
Self-pay ratesClear, upfront self-pay rates — no surprises, no fine print. You’ll know the cost before your first visit.
Initial psychiatric evaluation
$250/ 1 hour
Follow-up visit
$150/ 30 min
Sliding-scale options are available — just ask.
About visiting us from Cerritos
Cerritos is easy to be insured in and awkward to drive from, and those two facts shape what we would suggest. Seventy-eight percent of working-age residents hold commercial coverage, and only 4.7 percent are uninsured. Compare that with Compton, where commercial coverage is 44.3 percent, or Huntington Park, where nearly a quarter of working-age adults have no plan at all. Fewer than one Cerritos resident in ten is on Medi-Cal, which is the coverage we cannot bill. For most people reading this, the insurance conversation is short and the real obstacles are the ordinary ones: time, and not being sure this is a doctor’s problem.
It usually is, if the thing has lasted. What we treat is the standard psychiatric range — depression, anxiety and panic, adult ADHD, bipolar disorder, PTSD, and the insomnia that so often arrives with all of them. What we provide is an evaluation that produces a real diagnosis, medication managed attentively, and follow-ups that adjust rather than rubber-stamp. What we do not provide is weekly therapy; when that is the missing piece we will say so.
Distance is the argument for doing most of this on video, and we would rather recommend that plainly than pretend the drive is nothing. The fastest route from Cerritos City Hall is a little over fourteen miles and about twenty-three minutes — and it contains a trap worth knowing, because the fastest route is also the longest. Going out on the 605 and back up the 405 beats both of the shorter-looking options; straight down the 405 is fewer miles but slower, and the 91 slower still. If you navigate by distance you will choose one of the slow ones.
So the pattern we would suggest for a Cerritos patient is the first appointment in person if you can manage it — an hour face to face is a better foundation for a diagnosis than an hour on a screen — and routine reviews by video after that. Forty-six miles of round trips a year, to spend fifteen minutes confirming a dose is working, is a poor use of an afternoon when the clinical content is identical either way.
There is no rail station in Cerritos; the closest platform is Norwalk Station at the eastern end of the C Line, and that is in Norwalk. Long Beach Transit reaches east as far as the Norwalk Boulevard corridor. Transit is not a realistic answer here.
One local aside, offered practically rather than decoratively. The city’s public library is the first titanium-clad public building in North America, and its entrance holds a fifteen-thousand gallon aquarium with a viewing window ten feet high. People in the early weeks of treatment often need somewhere to be that asks nothing of them — not a cafe where you must order, not a park in the rain — somewhere indoors, free, quiet and legitimate to sit in for an hour. A library with a large tank of fish in the lobby answers that better than most things a clinician can prescribe.
One smaller note, for a group that often assumes otherwise. About 1,256 Cerritos residents are veterans, and TRICARE and TriWest are both plans we contract with, so a military family here is covered on the same terms as everyone else.
In crisis, 988 answers by call or text; the county mental health line is (800) 854-7771.
Getting here
Travelling from Cerritos
Distances and times below are Google's, timed on a weekday at the hour each route note states, in the traffic it labels usual for that route. Allow longer at the peaks each note says were not sampled.
By car
From Cerritos City Hall the fastest way here is 14.4 miles and about 23 minutes via I-605 south then I-405 north. Timed on a weekday evening. Morning and afternoon peaks were not sampled.
google.comchecked
Both shorter options take longer — 12.2 miles down the 405 comes to about 26 minutes and 12.1 miles along the 91 to about 27, so the longest route on the map is the quickest in practice. Timed on a weekday evening. Morning and afternoon peaks were not sampled.
google.comchecked
By transit
No Metro rail station lies inside Cerritos; the closest is Norwalk Station, the eastern terminus of the C Line, which sits in the city of Norwalk.
gitlab.comchecked
Long Beach Transit's Routes 101 and 103 reach east along the Carson Street and Norwalk Boulevard corridors toward Lakewood Center, the closest its network comes to Cerritos.
ridelbt.comchecked
Local
Other resources in Cerritos
These are listed because they are useful. We have no referral arrangement with any of them.
Cerritos is served by the Los Angeles County health and mental health systems rather than by a city department of its own.
dmh.lacounty.govchecked
The county's mental health help line answers at (800) 854-7771 every hour of every day and can arrange service referrals or a crisis assessment.
dmh.lacounty.govchecked
Dialing or texting 988 connects to the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline nationwide.
988lifeline.orgchecked
Related
Read up before your first visit
Frequently asked questions
Which route from Cerritos is actually fastest?
The long one. Taking the 605 south and then the 405 north is 14.4 miles and about 23 minutes; the more direct-looking 405 run is 12.2 miles but 26 minutes, and the 91 is 12.1 miles and 27. Cerritos is a city where the shortest route is the slowest, so trust the time rather than the mileage.
Is there a train from Cerritos?
Not from inside the city. The nearest rail is Norwalk Station, the eastern end of the C Line, and it is in Norwalk rather than Cerritos. Long Beach Transit's 101 and 103 come east as far as the Norwalk Boulevard corridor. For most Cerritos patients this is a drive or a video visit.
Will you take my insurance?
Very probably. Commercial coverage runs at 78.3 percent among working-age Cerritos residents and only 4.7 percent are uninsured, a payer profile closer to Redondo Beach than to anywhere on the 710 corridor. Fewer than one in ten residents is on Medi-Cal, which is the coverage we cannot bill.
I find phone calls hard. Can I book without calling?
Yes. Appointments can be requested online and a real person confirms them. If social anxiety is part of what brings you in, starting with the form rather than the phone is a sensible accommodation and not something anyone here will remark on.
Is a video visit as good as coming in?
The clinical content is the same, and from Cerritos the arithmetic favours it. The first appointment is still worth doing in person if you can manage it, because an hour face to face is a better foundation for a diagnosis than an hour on a screen. Routine reviews are a different question: close to thirty miles of round trip to confirm a dose is working is a poor use of an afternoon.
I mainly just cannot sleep. Is that a psychiatric problem?
Often, yes, and it is one of the more treatable things we see. Insomnia arrives alongside depression, anxiety and a long list of other conditions, and it is frequently the symptom that finally makes someone pick up the phone. It is worth an evaluation on its own terms rather than waiting for something more obviously psychiatric to justify the appointment.
Book the first one in person
Request a time online. A real person confirms every appointment, in person or by secure video.