Tagged With "Prevention"

This trauma-informed, culturally sensitive HIV intervention will focus on the diverse subset of the men who have sex with men (MSM) community who have experienced at least one adverse childhood experience (ACE). Current data suggests exposure to ACEs increases a person’s risk to contracting HIV; as such, our program will be based in resilience. Through education, peer mentoring, motivational interviewing, and therapy sessions, we will guide our participants toward safer sex practices. These...

Summary There are four common co-occurring issues—parental substance abuse, parental mental illness, domestic violence, and child conduct problems—that are related to parenting and that lead to child maltreatment (Barth, 2009). Understanding and responding to these issues is vital for our parental education programming goals of preventing abuse and other forms of maltreatment. My program will be focusing its efforts in low-income communities where resources for parents may not be readily...

Building Resilience with Children During Racial Discrimination & Violence: This attached Resilience Brief for Children has been the hardest one I have written yet. I have been an active advocate for the equal treatment of people from all backgrounds, religions, ethnic heritages, orientations, and families my entire life. It is hard to see the pain present today, not only due to COVID19 but also due to the harm and anger we see daily in the news. I want to share a story about the person...

The organization Zero To Three estimates that in the U.S., a child is taken into the child welfare system every six seconds. “Many of society’s most intractable problems can be traced back to childhood adversity. Being in the child welfare system increases the likelihood of more adversity and criminality. Baby court is a proven approach to healing the trauma of both child and parent, and breaking the cycle of maltreatment,” says Mimi Graham, Ed.D ., director of the Florida State University...

My grant proposal is focused on an intervention which addresses cardiovascular illnesses in racial and ethic minorities with a history of ACEs in the United States. Project activities consist of informational nutrition classes concerning the preparation of low-sodium meals, physical exercise, mental health counseling, social group support, and heart health education sessions. While the program will touch upon each level of the McLeroy social ecological model to some degree, the community and...

This trauma-informed program provides formalized sexuality education to students in Alachua County Public Schools (ACPS) who have experienced adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), putting them more at risk to negative health outcomes including sexually transmitted infections (STIs) (Felitti et al., 1998). Current sexual education programs in Florida neglect valuable information on anatomical functions, hygiene, STIs, birth control, and even what constitutes healthy relationships: a pivotal...

This handout is based on the work of Donna Jackson Nakazawa , who worked with us and generously allowed us to paraphrase content from her book, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology & How You Can Heal . Donna's book specifically addresses those of us parenting with ACEs (which she also does brilliantly in the powerful documentary, Wrestling Ghosts , which is about parenting and healing from ACEs). This handout can be downloaded, distributed, and used freely. It is...

The dose-response relationship between adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and mental illness is a public health concern. Findings from literature have illustrated the importance of early interventions in order to alleviate the effects of ACEs and improve children’s development (Felitti et al., 1998). The proposed grant seeks to explore ACEs in children aged 12-17 years old in Leon County, Florida. The provision of mental and physical resources at various levels of the social ecological...

An ever-increasing number of studies show a correlation between the number of ACEs and devastating health and behavioral events later in life. To prevent these outcomes, we must prevent the occurrence of ACEs, which means directing prevention efforts at the parental level. An often-overlooked population is the military spouse community and the children of active-duty military members. With spouses who are often not co-located with their family and the transient life of forced moves every...

The highest rates of suicide fatality among adolescents are among American Indian/Alaskan native (AI/AN) males and females between the ages of 15-19; however, rural northwestern Alaskan Inupiat adolescents have rates disproportionally higher than other AI/AN youth. Camp Power is an intervention designed to build resiliency and reduce suicide among Inupiat Youth. It is a 4-week summer camp program for Inupiat youth, ages 15-19 It uses cultural practices to help build resilience centered...

In 2022, 537 infants—or 11.2 infants per 1,000 childbearing persons ages 15 to 19 years—were born to adolescents in Orange County, Florida (Bureau of Community Health Assessment, 2022). Adolescent pregnancy is associated with numerous maternal and child health risks that pose significant public health concern (Flaviano & Harville, 2020) and a strong dose-response relationship exists between the number of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and adolescent pregnancy with teen pregnancy...

Grant Proposal Summary Childhood sexual abuse (CSA) poses a significant public health concern, with Dorchester County, SC, experiencing alarming rates. Despite this, the county lacks dedicated long-term support services for survivors, especially in gynecological care. This project addresses this critical gap by implementing trauma-informed gynecological care for adult survivors of CSA in Dorchester County aged 18-65. Survivors receiving care at Tri-County SPEAKS, where I worked for three...