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It was almost a ritual, but one that regularly disrupted the parenting class at a San Francisco-based child abuse prevention organization. Every time a siren blared in the streets below, a female participant bolted out of the room to seek safety in the windowless interior rooms of the multilevel labyrinthine white Victorian that houses Safe & Sound . Molly Jardiniano And it didn’t just happen in the parenting class. “When she heard the fire trucks, she said she would become paralyzed,...

If you work directly with people in Napa County and consider yourself a paraprofessional, you can apply to the year long RAISE: Resilience, ACEs Integration, Support & Education program offered by Resilient Napa with support from Napa County Mental Health. To apply, simply complete a short online application and have your manager/supervisor complete a participation agreement. If you are a manager/supervisor, please recommend the program to employees you think would benefit from learning...

It started as an answer to a youth-led campaign. Young people in arts programs in San Francisco Bay Area schools had produced spoken word videos about inequities in their communities that helped put them at risk for type 2 diabetes. Dr. Jean Junior The response by their peers was enormous, according to Dr. Jean Junior, who volunteered for the project as a pediatric resident at the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF). “Young people would say ‘You’ve actually gotten me interested.

Photo by Terabass/ CC-SA-3.0 It was around 2010 that Dr. Angela Bymaster was seeing a disturbing pattern in the histories of her adult patients. She already knew that patients who saw her at the Valley Homeless Health Care Program in San Jose, CA, where she worked at the time, were homeless or recently homeless. What was most troubling to Bymaster was knowing that their current precarious existence could have been prevented. Dr. Angela Bymaster “Over and over and over again I was hearing the...

Are you a paraprofessional who works with Napa clients with high ACE scores? Do you want to learn more about yourself and how your own personal experience might impact your ability to serve your clients the way you'd like to? Do you seek to build your own resilience to prevent job stress and burn out? If so, consider applying for Resilient Napa's MHSA Innovations, Integrate ACEs, Build Resilience Program. You must be willing to commit to all 12 once- a-month sessions beginning September...

Resilient Napa is a community wide initiative to prevent, address and heal childhood adversity and build resilience and hope. It is open to anyone with a desire to help transform Napa. The Members Council meets the fourth Tuesday of every month at Cope Family Center, 707 Randolph, Napa at 10:30 011:45 am. For more information, contact Sarah Rock, director, at sarahrockconsulting@gmail.com.

As far back as she can remember, Berkeley City College Mental Health Specialist Janine Greer understood that there was a connection between adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and health. She had a sense early on that racism figures large in that equation. “Looking around in my community – I’m African American, I noticed that even people who had healthy habits got funky diseases,” she said. “And I’m thinking there must be some sort of health trouble that happens if you’re always stressed.”...

Applications due June 18. Application link included in this post

On an ACEs Connection webinar on Monday, Dr. Andrew Seaman, an assistant professor at Oregon Health & Science University, showed how he navigates his students through the science of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). And, in an unusual twist for a webinar, Seaman and O’Nesha Cochran, a peer mentor with the Mental Health Association of Oregon, role-played doctor-patient interactions to show how to develop the skills to communicate with patients with high ACE scores. About 90 people...

On an ACEs Connection webinar on Monday, Dr. Andrew Seaman, an assistant professor at Oregon Health & Science University, showed how he navigates his students through the science of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). And, in an unusual twist for a webinar, Seaman and O’Nesha Cochran, a peer mentor with the Mental Health Association of Oregon, role-played doctor-patient interactions to show how to develop the skills to communicate with patients with high ACE scores. About 90 people...

Finally it begins; the talk of the struggle in Napa County has transitioned to the walk (or the march) , and thanks to Ashley Ochoa and Jenny Waken, voices of Napa County residents are being heard! I was so excited to be a part of this march, to see the lit up and excited faces of so many who came together with the same passion for change, and the same drive to fight (safely) for a difference that's long over-due! The challenge of having a dual diagnosis can be a detrimental reality ending...

When the question of screening patients for adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) was first raised a couple of years ago, Santa Barbara pediatrician Andria Ruth had mixed feelings about it.