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Child Abuse DV/IPV Sexual Assault

Since Last we Spoke, Post-Conference Edition

How fantastic was this year’s IAFN conference? I’ve been going to it for I don’t know how many years, and I truly don’t recall a better one. Kudos to the IAFN staff, Board and planning committee for making it such a great one. I loved meeting so many of you, and I was blown away by how many folks are regular readers, so thanks for supporting our nerdy little site.

By the time you read this, I will be in Italy for a court martial. Sunday was spent crossing the country, kissing my wife goodbye at Dulles and then hopping a flight to Venice via London. I’ll be here all week, so it’s possible posts will be light this week, too. I promise to get back to regular posts next week. Honest. In the meantime, here’s some of what’s caught my attention since last we spoke:

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DV/IPV Sexual Assault

Health Impact of Intimate Partner Violence (+ Live IPV Course)

Did I mention that I’m doing a webinar for the Tribal Forensic Healthcare project November 3rd? It’s going to be on the health consequences of IPV, and it’ll be held from 3-4:30pm ET. As with all offerings from this project, CEUs and CMEs are available. Click through for details about the webinar and our live 3-day IPV course for clinicians:

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Child Abuse DV/IPV Sexual Assault

Worthwhile Read: Connecting the Dots

Screen Shot 2014-10-02 at 5.59.42 PMThe CDC and the Prevention Institute published Connecting the Dots: An Overview of the Links Among Multiple Forms of Violence recently, but it didn’t seem to get much in the way of fanfare when it was released. That being said,  I think it’s an important read. Our patients frequently experience multiple forms of violence in their lives, and understanding the overlap allows for more trauma-informed care and more targeted assistance. What’s nice about this report is that it also comes with its own slide deck for teaching purposes, so this is a great resource to bookmark for future use.

(Image via)

 

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Child Abuse DV/IPV Sexual Assault

Since Last We Spoke 9-29-14

Let me start by saying that I absolutely loved all the personal notes people sent me about last week’s post. Apparently it resonated with many of you, and I really enjoyed hearing the different perspectives on the topic. Also–we’ve just put the finishing touches on a big new project I should be able to announce in the next 10 days or so (fingers crossed), so stay tuned. It’s something we’ll definitely be talking about in Phoenix next month. Speaking of which: anyone else scrambling to get their presentations finished? We’re finalizing a couple brand new sessions for this year’s conference, so that’s part of my week right there. But before we get too far into my to-do list, let’s chat about what’s caught my attention since last we spoke:

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Uncategorized

Worthwhile Read: Modeling Trauma Informed Practice

My friend Sally tweeted this resource out and I thought it was worth sharing here. It’s a brief piece called Walking the Walk: Modeling Trauma Informed Practice In the Training Environment (PDF). I’m still chewing on this a bit, but I think there are great ideas here. And the intent behind it is an important one:

One of the key components of building organizational capacity for trauma informed practice is professional development. Staff needs training to gain basic understanding about trauma, its prevalence and impact on individuals, families, communities and organizations; what it means to be trauma informed; and specific skills and techniques for providing services in a trauma informed manner. It is not enough, however, to just “inform” professionals about trauma in our efforts to establish a trauma informed workforce. It is essential that in the process of providing professional development and workforce training we imbed and model principles of trauma informed practice in the training environment.

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Child Abuse Sexual Assault

Working with Men Sexually Abused in Childhood

1in6 is hosting a webinar next week, Working with Men Sexually Abused in Childhood. It will be held September 17th from 10:30-12pm PT. Click through for the description; this one is so relevant to the work we do in all aspects of our clinical world, so I encourage you to check it out.

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DV/IPV Sexual Assault

Worthwhile Read: #WhyIStayed & #WhyILeft

In the wake of the Ray Rice video there has been some spectacular reading dominating my Twitter feed. Certainly more than I can keep up with. I recommend checking out the entries under the hashtags #WhyIStayed and #WhyILeft (and also #WhenILeft). They would make a great jumping off point for talks with your team about the realities our patients experience every day, or the basis for an inservice for Emergency Department or L&D personnel (especially if you’re hearing crap like “I don’t know why she expects us to care about her when she clearly doesn’t”, or other such nonsense).

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DV/IPV Sexual Assault

Since Last We Spoke 9-8-14

I woke up this morning at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington, very far from home and decidedly still on east coast time. I’ll be here for a hot minute before I move on to Billings, MT where we are rolling out a brand new IPV curriculum (super excited about that), so this week is a long one. I will attempt regular posts, but forgive me if they’re a bit light this week. You just never know how a new course will go. This weekend consisted of a lot of prep, but there was still plenty of distraction–here’s what caught my eye since last we spoke:

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Child Abuse Sexual Assault

Confronting Commercial Sexual Exploitation and Sex Trafficking of Minors in the United States: A Guide for the Health Care Sector

The National Academy of Sciences released their book, Confronting Commercial Sexual Exploitation and Sex Trafficking of Minors in the United States: A Guide for the Healthcare Sector. This is based on the 2013 report of the same name, but is specific to clinicians. The download is available for free, but site registration is required.

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Uncategorized

Unaccompanied Immigrant Minors Town Hall

From an email announcement I received today:

The National Center for Child Traumatic Stress (NCCTS) in collaboration with the NCTSN Culture Consortium, Terrorism and Disaster Program and Policy Taskforce, is sponsoring a Virtual Town Hall meeting to address the recent surge in unaccompanied immigrant minors from a trauma-informed perspective. Unaccompanied immigrant minors are youth who come to the United States without a legal guardian and without legal immigration documents. There has also been a surge of young children who come with their caregiver across the border of the United States without immigration documentation. The 90-minute Town Hall is scheduled for Tuesday, September 16th at 9 Pacific / 11 Central / 12 Eastern (see attached flyer). All are welcome!

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Articles of Note Child Abuse DV/IPV Elder Abuse/Neglect Sexual Assault

Articles of Note: August 2014 Edition

Time once again for Articles of Note, my list of the things that have caught my attention in the latest round of peer-reviewed journals. This month has quite a lot to explore, but as always, this list isn’t comprehensive (and it’s subject to my specific interests). The majority of links take you to the PubMed abstract, except where indicated. Click through for the PDF and active links; contact me for the list as a Word doc.

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DV/IPV Sexual Assault

Adolescent Consent and Privacy Issues

I was just having a discussion this week about the issue of consent with teens, so the timing of this is perfect: one of the Tribal Forensic Healthcare project’s September webinars is Adolescent Consent and Privacy Issues. The session will be held September 16th from 3-4:30pm ET. As with all of their webinars, CEs are available and free. Click through for all of the details.

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DV/IPV Sexual Assault

Worthwhile Read: Till Death Do Us Part (Trigger Warning)

Ironically, I am in South Carolina today, teaching at a course focusing in part on investigating and prosecuting domestic violence. I tell you this because the Charleston, SC Post and Courier has just published an expose on domestic violence in the state, Till Death Do Us Part. The series, a result of an 8-month investigation, specifically looks at how the state is failing victims (the murder rate for women in South Carolina is twice that of the nation), examining issues related to patriarchy, access to guns, religion, legislation and more. Even if you don’t live in South Carolina, it’s a worthwhile and powerful read; the online site includes videos featuring survivors and their families, timelines, and more. Take some time out for this one.

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DV/IPV

Domestic Violence Case Review

The Tribal Forensic Healthcare project has an upcoming webinar, Domestic Violence Case Review. The session will be held August 28th from 3-4:30 ET. Kim Nash is the featured presenter and CEUs/CMEs are available. Click through for details:

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Child Abuse DV/IPV Sexual Assault Testimony

Since Last We Spoke 8-4-14

I’m on my way to the NAC (for the 2nd of 3 trips down there in a month)–we’re kicking off the inaugural run of a fantastic (I hope) interactive testimony course for SANEs and prosecutors. Considering we started working on this about 18 months ago, it’s exciting to finally see it come to fruition. And a bit nerve-wracking, as all 1st time courses can be. I was pretty focused on prep this weekend and didn’t spend a lot of time surfing the interwebs, but there were still a few things that caught my eye since last we spoke:

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Child Abuse DV/IPV Sexual Assault

Clinical Guide: Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting

After yesterday’s post I received a request from an FHO reader for more resources on caring for patients who have experienced female genital mutilation/cutting (literature seems to be divided on the proper terminology so I am using both here). Not surprisingly, there isn’t a huge amount of clinically-focused information out there, and much of it is specific to obstetrics. I rounded up what appeared to be the best and most current articles and clinical guidelines (mostly free full-text) and included links to previous FHO posts addressing the same topic. As always, it’s not exhaustive (I opted to leave most of the obstetric-specific information out), but hopefully it’s useful.

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Child Abuse DV/IPV Sexual Assault

Since Last We Spoke 7-28-14

Today is my sweet kid’s 13th birthday, so I am officially the parent of a teenager. I have no idea how that happened. A minute ago she was a newborn and now she’s this funny, interesting, incredibly smart kid who makes me proud every day. Naturally we spent the weekend celebrating (ziplining and dim sum, anyone?) and gorging on homemade Hostess-type treats (my spouse whipped up Twinkies, Ho-Hos and Cupcakes complete with squiggly frosting). Pretty much the only thing I could do after the weekend calorie bombardment was to loll around last night and surf my social media sites. Which is what I did. Here’s what caught my eye since last we spoke:

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Child Abuse Sexual Assault

Full-Text Friday: Best Clinical Practices for Male Adult Survivors of Childhood Sexual Abuse

This week’s full-text offering is from The Permanente Journal and it addresses an issue that certainly doesn’t get discussed enough in healthcare circles: male patients who have experienced child sexual abuse. Coincidentally, I just saw that IAFN posted this article on Facebook, as well, so perhaps some of you have read the article already. If not, I recommend it. Click through for more details:

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Child Abuse DV/IPV

Worthwhile Read: Futures’ Health E-Bulletin Summer 2014

The newest edition of Futures Without Violence‘s Health E-Bulletin (PDF) is now available. Particularly useful is the 1st article on why the ACA-mandated domestic violence screening matters and the one on reproductive coercion. Worth your time.

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Child Abuse Sexual Assault

Full-Text Friday: Multiple Perpetrator Assaults

This week’s Full-Text Friday offering addresses the issue of multiple perpetrator rapes of adolescent girls (sad commentary: I can’t combine those words in the title of this post because of the disgusting trolls that come out of the woodwork). I hear a lot of speculative testimony, and occasionally it is about expectations of injury following sexual assault by multiple assailants. There’s not a ton of research on this topic, so I am pleased to offer this article up as a way to help inform us about the clinical picture of this patient population: