Category Archives: Washington State

Heavy childhood trauma ups risk of child/teen suicide 51x; so how does a community prevent it?

January 22, 2013 By in ACE Study, Alaska, Child trauma, Community prevention programs, Solutions, Washington State 4 Comments

Dr. Linda Chamberlain lives in Alaska, where suicide rates are “typically double the national rate”, she says in lindathis blog post on the web site of the Scattergood Foundation. She’s the Thomas Scattergood Scholar on Child Behavioral Health this year. As founder of the Alaska Family Violence Prevention Project, she’s concerned about domestic violence and child abuse, which the CDC’s Adverse Childhood Experiences Study found are risk factors for suicide. She points out how ACEs increase the risk of suicide:

Early adverse childhood experiences [ACEs] dramatically increase the risk of suicidal behaviors.  ACEs have a strong, graded relationship to suicide attempts during childhood/adolescent and adulthood.  An ACE score of 7 or more increased the risk of suicide attempts 51-fold among children/adolescents and 30-fold among adults (Dube et al, 2001).  In fact, Dube and colleagues commented that their estimates of population attributable fractions for ACEs and suicide are “of an order of magnitude that is rarely observed in epidemiology and public health data.”  Nearly two-thirds (64%) of suicide attempts among adults were attributable to ACEs and 80% of suicide attempts during childhood/adolescence were attributed to ACEs.  Further, while system responses to family violence continue to place greater emphasis on physical forms of abuse, the strongest predictor of future suicide attempts in ACE research was emotional abuse.

Holy Toledo. These numbers are nothing but scary. And tragic.

One of the ways that communities can begin to prevent suicide is to understand adverse childhood

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Tiny steps add up to building healthy communities in WA, PA, NC, DE and NY

October 23, 2012 By in ACE Study, Child trauma, Community prevention programs, New York, Washington State Leave a comment

The Children’s Resilience Initiative in Walla Walla, WA, is one of 42 cities and towns in Washington State that’s using research to improve the health of its community. (Some day soon I’ll tell you the story about how a state built a state-wide community network that pulled off some miraculous and remarkably innovative cost- and life-saving changes, and then how the state — perhaps inadvertently — yanked the plug on the community it built.)

The research includes the CDC’s Adverse Childhood Experience Study (ACE Study), studies that show how toxic stress damages children’s brains, and economic analyses that shows how prevention programs reduce health, criminal justice and social service costs.

For CRI, this means taking many tiny steps that add up to big changes. These tiny steps focus on how this community of about 30,000 souls builds in resilience

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Adverse childhood experiences affect unemployment; Maté: childhood trauma is universal template for addiction; “Runaway Girl” — from street life to MBA

August 23, 2012 By in ACE Study, Child abuse, Child trauma, Chronic disease, Neurobiology, Washington State 2 Comments

Most of the talk about the CDC’s Adverse Childhood Experiences Study (ACE Study) focuses on the link between ACEs and adult onset of chronic disease; depression, suicide and other mental health issues; violence and being a victim of violence. There’s been less attention on the finding that the higher a person’s ACE score, the increased risk of absenteeism from work, serious financial problems and serious job problems. Now there’s evidence that ACEs affect unemployment, too.

When researchers from the CDC’s National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion examined the data from ACE surveys in five states, which included 17,469 people between the ages of 18 and 64, they found that the 2009 unemployment rate of men and women was “significantly higher among those who reported having had any ACEs than among those who reported no ACEs”, according to the study published in Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology. Two-thirds of the people in the study had at least one ACEs; 15.1 % of men and 19.3 % of women reported having had four or more ACEs.

Some folks have already taken this information to heart.

When Washington State did its own ACE survey in 2009, it found a “stunning fact”, says Laura Porter, director of ACE partnerships in the state’s Department of Social and Health Service: The survey revealed that “52% of functional disability is attributable to ACES.” Because of how much ACEs contribute to the list of barriers to employment, there’s now a push to integrate ACE concepts into the Department of Vocational Rehabilitation, which helps people with disabilities find work. Many of the state’s communities have already integrated ACE concepts into public health, schools and juvenile justice.

On a national level, ReadyNation, formerly the Partnership for America’s Economic Success, has

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The painful side of compassion emerges when we can’t help a student

August 1, 2012 By in Child abuse, Child trauma, Community prevention programs, Lincoln, Our stories, Washington State 1 Comment

[Editor’s note: In April, I posted a story about how Lincoln High School reduced its suspensions 85% by using a new method of school discipline. So many people were intrigued by how Lincoln High works that we thought you might be interested in these essays by Lincoln’s staff and students.]  

By Jim Sporleder
Principal, Lincoln High School

When you’re working with students that have high ACE scores, not every story is successful. You’re going to experience pain, just as you’re going to experience joy.

Stacy (not her real name) came to Lincoln High when she was a freshman. Because of a learning disability and her mental health, she was identified as a special education student. Somehow she missed acquiring that designation when she was in elementary and middle school. It’s unfortunate, because she had very special needs.

Stacy is a cutter. When she is upset, she cuts her wrists and arms. She’s been doing this for a long time: both arms have dozens of scars. Her parents swing between horrific verbal abuse and emotional neglect. They ignore her cutting or criticize her for trying to get attention.

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Video shows how Walla Walla, WA, high school integrates resilience into school discipline

June 27, 2012 By in ACE Study, Child trauma, Community prevention programs, Solutions, Washington State Leave a comment

Washington State’s League of Education Voters (LEV) produced this video about Lincoln High School, the alternative school in Walla Walla, WA, that took a different approach to school discipline and reduced its suspension rate by more than 85% percent over two years. LEV, founded in 2001 by parents, students,

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Massachusetts, Washington State lead U.S. trauma-sensitive school movement

May 31, 2012 By in ACE Study, Child trauma, Chronic disease, Community prevention programs, Neurobiology, Solutions, Washington State 20 Comments

Washington State determined that 13 out of every 30 students in a classroom will have toxic stress from 3 or more traumatic experiences. Those children are likely to be more “unruly”, more “unmotivated” or more absent than the others. Source: Washington State Family Policy Council.

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TRAUMA-SENSITIVE SCHOOLS. TRAUMA-INFORMED classrooms. Compassionate schools. Safe and supportive schools. All different names to describe a movement that’s taking shape and gaining momentum across the country.

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Lincoln High School in Walla Walla, WA, tries new approach to school discipline — suspensions drop 85%

April 23, 2012 By in ACE Study, Child abuse, Child trauma, Chronic disease, Community prevention programs, Neurobiology, Solutions, Washington State 543 Comments

Jim Sporleder, principal of Lincoln High School

THE FIRST TIME THAT principal Jim Sporleder tried the New Approach to Student Discipline at Lincoln High School in Walla Walla, WA, he was blown away. Because it worked.

In fact, it worked so well that he never went back to the Old Approach to Student Discipline.

This is how it went down: A student blows up at a teacher, drops the F-bomb. The usual approach at Lincoln – and, safe to say, at most high schools in this country – is automatic suspension.

Instead, Sporleder sits the kid down and says quietly: “Wow. Are you OK? This doesn’t sound like you. What’s going on?” He gets even more specific: “You really looked stressed. On a scale of 1-10, where are you with your anger?”

The kid was ready. Ready, man! For an anger blast to his face….”How could you do that?” “What’s wrong with you?”…and for the big boot out of school. But he was NOT ready for kindness. The armor-plated Continue reading →

Roundup: Autism and obesity? Talking ACEs in Olympia, WA; childhood trauma and lower IQ scores; Catholic clergy child sex abuse cases up 15%

April 11, 2012 By in ACE Study, Child abuse, Child trauma, Washington State 3 Comments

You’ve probably heard about the research in Pediatrics showing that children born to obese mothers are at higher risk of autism. “The study of more than 1,000 children found that the offspring of obese mothers had a 67 percent higher risk of autism than the children of normal-weight moms, and more than double the risk of having developmental delays, such as language impairment,” according to an overview on HealthDay.com. But did you see this important bit of context provided by Bryan Fung on TheAtlantic.com?

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Port Townsend, WA, learns that to change health culture, it takes a community

March 30, 2012 By in ACE Study, Child trauma, Chronic disease, Community prevention programs, Neurobiology, Solutions, Washington State 1 Comment

Nate (l) and Nico Winegar play with pinwheels that symbolize Port Townsend’s “Our Kids: Our Business” campaign

Last week, I posted a story about how a family services clinic in Port Townsend, WA, includes childhood trauma in regular health screenings for pregnant women and families. They’re doing this because the research is very clear: Toxic stress from adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) causes adult onset of chronic diseases, such as heart disease and diabetes. It causes suicide and depression. It also leads to committing violence or becoming victim of violence.

The purpose is to reduce toxic stress in children, so that they grow up to be healthier and happier.

As far as the staff at Jefferson County Public Health knows, they are the first in the country to figure out a way to integrate into their daily work the research

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Public health clinic adds child trauma to smoking, alcohol, HIV screening

March 23, 2012 By in ACE Study, Child trauma, Neurobiology, Solutions, Washington State 13 Comments

When a pregnant woman visits the Jefferson County Public Health clinic in Port Townsend, WA, a town of about 9,000 people on the northeast tip of the Olympic Peninsula, she’s asked the typical questions about tobacco, alcohol and other drug use. She’s also screened for something that most public heath departments, ob-gyns or primary care providers don’t even consider asking: her childhood trauma.

That’s because the public health nurses at Family Health Services know that a childhood full of toxic stress causes a lifetime of health problems, and, if not addressed, is usually passed on from parent to child.

But setting up a system to screen for child trauma, which seems so logical in hindsight, wasn’t an easy thing to do, says Quen Zorrah, a public health nurse who led the effort. Even after years of talking, reading research and preparation, the staff was still reluctant. But in the end, she and her co-workers concluded: If we can teach a client to put on a condom, we can ask a client about ACEs.

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