Labor Day weekend, 2009. Eleven years after the first research paper about the Adverse Childhood Experiences Study came out in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. Its co-founders thought that the results rang so clear and true that the medical, public health and social services communities would embrace its findings immediately. So far, it’s been a relative handful of very observant social service experts who work in cultures that embrace change. The medical and public health communities are moving more slowly.

Doesn’t it seem as if the most revolutionary ideas take a very long time to wend their way through our society to

Pyramid represents ACE Study concept

adoption and integration? Perhaps it takes so long, because the truly revolutionary ideas ping so many different institutions and cultures.

It’s also four years after I wrote my first article about the ACE Study. “Targeting obesity at its roots: Childhood trauma may be at the core of the epidemic of overweight adults” appeared in the Sacramento Bee’s Sunday Forum section. There’s no link, because only staff-written articles remain in their archives. So, I’ve appended the article to the end of this post.

Thanks to Connie Valentine, founder of the Incest Survivors Speakers Bureau in Davis, CA, for introducing me to Dr. Vincent Felitti, retired chief of Kaiser Permanente’s Department of Preventive Medicine in San Diego and Continue reading →