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Just this week, The American Farm Bureau released a survey they commissioned on the issue of rural stress and mental health. It was taken just last month. The results show two in five rural adults say stress and mental health have become more of a problem in their community in the past five years. Also, 36% say it's gotten worse in the last year. Nearly half of rural adults say they are personally experiencing more mental health challenges than they were a year ago and it seems to be worse...

On Thursday April 25, 2019 Voices hosted over 950 attendees at the Virginia Summit on Childhood Trauma and Resilience . The goal of the Summit was to connect child-serving professionals and advocates across the Commonwealth to best practices to prevent, and better address, the impacts of childhood adversity. California’s first Surgeon General and well-known ACEs expert, Dr. Nadine Burke Harris, provided the keynote address. Both Governor Northam and First Lady Pamela Northam addressed the...

States have long been laboratories for innovations that influence the health and well-being of their residents. This role has only expanded with the greater flexibility being given to the states, especially as gridlock in Washington, D.C. inspires more local action. The bevvy of new governors and state legislators who took office early this year also widens the door to creativity. Medicaid is perhaps the most familiar example of state leadership on health. With costs and decisions shared by...

Hello, Welcome to our April newsletter! This month, we are busy making plans for Illinois' inaugural Trauma-Informed Awareness Day coming up on May 15. Find out more about Trauma-Informed Awareness Day and all the great events happening throughout Illinois in this month's newsletter...

The attached table summarizes all of the statutes and passed resolutions that contain the words "Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs)" and trauma-informed language through the end of 2018. There are nearly 60 statutes with the earliest law enacted in Washington State in 2011. The laws are categorized by subject matter such health care, education, training, and funding. If you are aware of something we missed, please leave a comment to this post.

Editor's note: In addition to an overview of how states are spending federal opioid dollars, the Bipartisan Policy Center report also includes 5 state in-depth briefs—Arizona, Louisiana, New Hampshire, Ohio and Tennessee. News release Tuesday, March 26, 2019 Washington, D.C. – In 2017, more than 70,000 people in the United States died from a drug overdose, with almost 50,000 of these deaths involving an opioid. Americans are now at greater risk of dying from an opioid overdose than a car...

As it did in 2018, the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) is tracking state legislation that contains the words “adverse childhood experiences” (ACEs). Trauma-related legislation that does not include those words is not included in the database. This link will take you to the Injury Prevention Legislation Database|Opioid Abuse Prevention page on the NCSL site to access the ACEs legislation database. Under “Topics,” choose the fist topic listed (ACEs) and under “States,” choose...

It’s long been suspected that the nation’s unprecedented drug overdose epidemic and sharply rising suicide rates are linked. Now health researchers are finding concrete evidence that the two preventable causes of death — which are among the top 10 in the United States — are intrinsically related: People with an opioid addiction are at much higher risk for suicide than the rest of the population; and opioid use was a contributing factor in more than 40% of all suicide and overdose deaths in...

As reported earlier by ACEs Connection , the Oregon legislature is considering a bill, S. 1037, to establish a Transformational Resilience Task Force to make transformational resilience education and skills-training available to all Oregonians by 2025. Under the bill, an 18-member task force would be created to study aspects of psychological, emotional, and psychosocial resilience education and skills training. r to l Bob Doppelt, David Pollak, Mandy Davis Oregon members of the International...

The US Department of Health and Human Services Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently updated information about the states' inclusion of the ACE module in the BRFSS (Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System Survey). The CDC reports that “…since 2009, 42 states plus the District of Columbia have included ACE questions for at least one year on their survey.” In 2018 alone, 17 states included the ACE module, four of them (Idaho, Indiana, New Jersey, and West Virginia) for...

A new study from the nonprofit Research for Action highlights “promising models” nationwide and calls on state lawmakers to implement a comprehensive approach in Pennsylvania. “There are two areas where the research is extremely clear. Childhood trauma is an extremely common experience, and traumatic stress can have a wide range of negative consequences for children,” said Rachel Comly, a senior analyst at Research for Action. The study recommends that schools provide professional...

A hearing will be held on April 3 on a recently introduced bill ( SB 1037 ) to create a task force to determine how to make resilience training available to all Oregonians in response to climate change. Under the bill, an 18-member task force would be created to study aspects of psychological, emotional, and psychosocial resilience education and skills training. The Oregon members of the International Transformation Resilience Coalition (ITRC), including ITRC coordinator, Bob Doppelt, have...