The community got a treat yesterday when Dr. Vincent Felitti visited Alpena Regional Medical Center to talk about a study he's been a part of for over 20 years.
People gathered at ARMC on Saturday to listen to San Diego based doctor Vincent Felitti speak about the incredible affects experiences in childhood have on grown adults years later.
The Adverse Childhood Experiences, or ACE study, was born out of a study looking at the obesity epidemic in the 1980's, when Dr. Felitti realized how things like growing up in a single parent home and childhood abuse could be major risk factors for the leading causes of illness and premature death in adult life.
The ACE study consists of a ten-category scale off which a person gains ace points regarding how many experiences on the scale they encountered in childhood.
"The way children are treated, what they experience in childhood, is very frequently damaged and overwhelmingly unrecognized in how this plays out destructively decades later in their lives," Dr. Felitti said.
Dr. Felitti describes that even the smallest things such as if someone is a smoker or not can be traced back to adverse childhood experiences, and it is incredibly important to understand how health and social problems in our country can come from these experiences.
[See the video at http://www.wbkb11.com/news/loc...s-dr-vincent-felitti]
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