August 2016

I am a licensed attorney in Alaska, although I went inactive for my license a number of years ago and no longer actively practice law. But I have had experience practicing criminal law and being active in public policy issues surrounding criminal law for decades. A number of years ago, I noted that in addition to Alaska Native men being overrepresented in Alaska jails by almost 100%, women were becoming an increasing part of the population that was incarcerated. As this study indicates [...

New research shows that firefighters and paramedics experience Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) at the same rate as combat veterans. One Tallahassee Fire Captain is hoping to change how local firefighters mental and emotional health needs are being met. Researchers from the International Association of Fire Fighters (IAFF) in Austin, Texas believed the traumatic situations stem from car accidents to mass casualty incidents. Captain Mike Bellamy of the Tallahassee Fire Department said it...

T he frenetic, isolating nature of city life can be a day-to-day struggle for millions of people. An environmental cocktail of densely packed streets and homes, cramped and lengthy commutes and noise pollution as well as significant pockets of poverty and deprivation can take their toll. As a result, mental ill health and urban life are inextricably linked. With urban areas expected to house two-thirds of the world’s population by 2050 and some cities, such as in China, undergoing...

Last week, the Department of Justice released its most expansive investigation of a troubled police department to date. It is the first of its kind to probe an issue that some academics and advocates have been researching and talking about for over a decade with little traction: sexual predators within the ranks of police officers. In two pages of their scathing 163-page report on the Baltimore Police Department, federal investigators recount complaints from civilians that officers coerce...

“Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.” –attributed to Martin Luther King, Jr. In December of 2014, one week after the non-indictment in the case of Michael Brown, in-Training published an article entitled “ A Lack of Care: Why Medical Students Should Focus on Ferguson .” In it, Jennifer Tsai argued that the systemic racism rampant in our law enforcement and criminal justice systems also permeates our health care system, affecting both...

It’s the crime no one wants to believe will occur — the sexual abuse of a child by a family member. Not long ago, it was a crime usually confined to a family’s darkest psychological corners, a secret few children talked about — partly because they lacked the ability to articulate acts that made no sense to them. Add threats by the perpetrator, often a person who is supposed to keep them safe, and it’s a wonder the crime ever got reported... ...

Gregory Finney, then 37, felt extremely unlucky but in good physical condition when he arrived at Louisiana State Penitentiary in 2001. He had been shipped to the notorious maximum-security prison in Angola to serve 15 years for drug possession and shoplifting. Up to that point in his life, Finney hadn’t worried much about his health, in part because he was too busy scrambling to hold a job and avoid getting arrested. It turned out his health should have been a main concern. Not long after...

A University of Colorado School of Medicine researcher and colleagues have conducted the first-ever survey of physicians on the validity of "abusive head trauma" as a medical diagnosis. While shaking a baby has been recognized as a dangerous form of child abuse since the early 1970s, the validity of "shaken baby syndrome" and "abusive head trauma" has been questioned recently in some major media reports, court decisions and medical literature. In at least one case, a U.S. Supreme Court...

Hi I am a family doctor in Toronto, and am interested in looking at our practice using the ACE questions. But I think the questions are too long and emotionally loaded for a busy family practice office. Does anyone know-Is there a shortened version i.e 2 questions that can be used as a screen, before proceeding to the full ACE? Bill Watson

[Ed. note: This is the second of a three-part series that David Bornstein is doing on how communities are integrating trauma-informed and resilience-building practices based on ACEs science.] Liberals and conservatives often disagree about the causes of poverty and other social ills. Broadly speaking, liberals point the finger at structural factors and advocate for policy changes, while conservatives look to individuals and families and favor behavior changes. Clearly, both points of view...

Albuquerque’s approach to ending homelessness is straightforward: Ask, and you shall receive. Ask for work, that is. Nearly one year ago, the New Mexico city’s government collaborated with St. Martin’s Hospitality Center , a local nonprofit homeless-services organization, to launch the There’s a Better Way van program with a radically simple mission: to provide real jobs to those sitting on the street, asking for work. As Albuquerque Mayor Richard Berry was heading home from the office one...

There are, the New York City public-school principal Kristina Beecher discovered, an awful lot of types of play blocks. There are wooden blocks, cardboard blocks, magnetic blocks, clear plastic blocks, number blocks, letter blocks, and fish-shaped blocks, to name a few. And all of them are advertised as the best possible blocks for outfitting a preschool classroom. Such choices have been faced by principals like Beecher across the city in the last two years as New York has moved to...