Tagged With "Alive and Well Communities"
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New Iowa ACEs Report released today
A new report from the Central Iowa ACEs 360 Coalition shows most Iowa adults have experienced childhood trauma, an indicator of higher rates of chronic diseases, mental illness, violence, risky behaviors, and reduced life expectancy among adults. The 2016 ACEs report, Beyond ACEs: Building Hope & Resiliency in Iowa, examines three years of data collected among adult Iowans measuring eight types of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), defined as physical, sexual and emotional abuse, and...
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Positive Childhood Experiences offset ACEs: Q & A with Dr. Robert Sege about HOPE
Tufts University medical professor Dr. Robert Sege directs the Center for Community-Engaged Medicine and is nationally known for his research on effective health systems approaches that address social determinants of health. He is also the principal investigator for the HOPE framework (Healthy Outcomes from Positive Experiences).The HOPE framework is based on research that shows how positive childhood experiences can mitigate the effects of adverse childhood experiences. Sege and colleagues...
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Power of Networks Tapped for National Trauma Campaign
In a mid-April conference call led by the Campaign for Trauma Informed Policy and Practice (CTIPP), participants from around the country—many of them active in ACEs, trauma and resilience networks—discussed the wave of trauma that is certain to slam communities in the wake of COVID-19. They also cheered a bit of hopeful news: the announcement of $3 billion in federal funding, the Governor’s Emergency Education Relief Fund, a portion of the CARES Act. The funds are flexible block grants for...
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PREPARING ADOLESCENTS FOR SELF-CARE --- A Transition Toolkit for Iowa’s Community Health Centers
I ntroduction Transition is the term used to describe the process by which adolescents move into adulthood. Transition encompasses ALL facets of adult life, including healthcare, education, employment, socialization and recreation. The...
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Racism Kills: What Community-Level Interventions Can Do About It [Rewire.news]
In the first two installments of this series, we addressed promising approaches for buffering the impact of racism on health—learning cognitive and emotional strategies, known as self-regulation , for coping with stress and building cultural connections that buffer the impacts of toxic stress. Both of those arenas are born out of social science research showing a connection between these elements and improved health outcomes, even in the face of significant adversity. But these individual...
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Resiliency triumphs over trauma [TheGazette.com]
Dr. Resmiye Oral, clinical professor of pediatrics and director of the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine’s Child Protection Program, wrote this guest blog for the Cedar Rapid Gazette: Psychological trauma resulting from childhood and adult adversities is strongly tied to negative health outcomes. Studies since the 1990s have identified that more than half of adults were exposed to at least one Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE), which may include events such as child abuse,...
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Resources from the 2018 Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) Conference
In October, I attended the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) Conference in San Francisco. It was really inspiring. Below please find share some of the books, videos, and resources that I learned about. All the best, Natalie BOOKS 1) The Deepest Well: Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Adversity by Nadine Burke Harris, MD https://centerforyouthwellness.org/the-deepest-well/ 2) The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma by Bessel van der Kolk, MD...
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Rotary luncheon to feature expert on adverse childhood experiences (Clinton Herald)
Winona Whitaker, Oct 3, 2019 for the Clinton Herald CLINTON – Programs for Rotary International’s noon Monday luncheons this month will address adverse childhood experiences , food insecurity, crime victims rights and staying healthy, the club announced this week. Luncheons are scheduled for noon each Monday at the Tuscany Event Center. The public may contact a Rotarian to join the luncheons as a guest. Leslie LaShelle-Mussman, Prevention Director with the Area Substance Abuse Council, will...
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Save the Date! Mental Health for Iowa Learners
Save the Date for an upcoming event hosted by Iowa Department on Education on meeting the mental health needs of Iowa learners. The event will be held April 22 and 23 in Des Moines. Please see attached flyer for more information. Thank you to Ellen...
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Trauma, poverty damaging to kids, doctor says
Traumatic experiences and poverty can damage young children’s brains just as surely as lead poisoning can, a national expert said Monday in Des Moines. Scientists increasingly understand that children’s brain growth can be stunted by a...
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Wisconsin state agencies end year one of trauma-informed learning community; goal is to be first trauma-informed state
Here in California, many people think that it’s only liberal Democrats who have a corner on championing the science of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and putting it into practice. That might be because people who use ACEs science don’t expel or suspend students, even if they’re throwing chairs and hurling expletives at the teacher. They ask "What happened to you?" rather than "What's wrong with you?" as a frame when they create juvenile detention centers where kids don’t fight, reduce...
Ask the Community
2015 Midwest Regional Summit
Please share here if you are from Iowa and attending the 2015 Midwest Regional Summit on Adverse Childhood Experiences in Chicago. We have a small group attending from Central Iowa, as well as a few other locations that we know of. For more on the...
Ask the Community
Getting this Type of Passion and Movement in Michigan
Sarah and Lisa, I have been impressed for sometime about how Iowa has moved on ACEs work. I lived in Carroll in 2012 and there wasn't this much movement at that time, I think you were all getting ready to take off but there has been...
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Advocate for a Resilient Iowa
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12 Myths of the Science of ACEs
The two biggest myths about ACEs science are: MYTH #1 — That it’s just about the 10 ACEs in the ACE Study — the CDC-Kaiser Permanente Adverse Childhood Experiences Study . It’s about sooooo much more than that. MYTH #2 — And that it’s just about ACEs…adverse childhood experiences. These two myths are intertwined. The ACE Study issued the first of its 70+ publications in 1998, and for many people it was the lightning bolt, the grand “aha” moment, the unexpected doorway into a blazing new...
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30 people can end ACEs in your county. Why aren’t they?
No, we don’t need the president nor congress. We do need the following people in your county to stop business as usual and focus on preventing adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). City mayors City counselors County commissioners School board members These local elected leaders—many of them your neighbors and colleagues—have the capacity to collectively understand the emotional and financial costs of ACEs and trauma. We can’t have family-friendly cities and counties while we live in an...
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A Bold New Chapter for the ACEs Coalition in Iowa
Since 2012, the Central Iowa ACEs 360 Coalition has brought together diverse partners to identify and seize opportunities for responding to the Adverse Childhood Experiences Study. This year, we worked with a consultant to establish our direction for the next three years. These conversations have affirmed our mission and identified a need to formalize how we approach our work to make greater progress. We invite you to read our new plan as we formalize into a 501(c)3.
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Central Iowa's Community Awareness Effort
Every day connections are far more important than we ever believed. Caring relationships can give children a great start. They can help people with a history of trauma heal. They can improve the health of our neighbors and the well-being of families....
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ACEs: Past struggles lead to successful futures [ViewFindergv.com]
Childhood experiences affect our development, influence our behaviors and help shape our outlook on life as we get older. Dr. Vincent Felitti of Kaiser Permanente and Dr. Robert Anda of the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention conducted an original study on adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) in the 1990s. Studies showed a strong correlation between traumatic experiences and poor adult health as well as social outcomes later in life. More than 17,000 adult members were surveyed about...
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ACEs Research Corner — October 2018
[Editor's note: Dr. Harise Stein at Stanford University edits a web site -- abuseresearch.info -- that focuses on the health effects of abuse, and includes research articles on ACEs. Every month, she's posting the summaries of the abstracts and links to research articles that address only ACEs. Thank you, Harise!! -- Jane Stevens] Harris HR, Wieser F, Vitonis AF, Rich-Edwards J, et. al. Early life abuse and risk of endometriosis. Hum Reprod. 2018 Sep 1;33(9):1657-1668. PMID: 30016439 Using...
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Alive and Well: Moving Missouri Toward Grass-Roots and System-Wide Change
On the eastern edge of Missouri, leaders of the Alive and Well network had generated a robust media campaign to help people understand the impact of trauma and toxic stress on health and well-being. There was a monthly column in an African-American newspaper, spots about toxic stress and resilience on urban radio stations and weekly public service features on the NBC affiliate, with physicians, clergy and teachers advocating ways to “be alive and well.” Two hundred and fifty miles to the...
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ArtForce Iowa - A Transformational Partnership
ArtForce Iowa is a 501c3 non-profit that was founded in 2012 by a group of concerned citizens, with a mission to transform youth in need through art. Working primarily with youth who have had involvement in the juvenile or family court system, or immigrant, refugee and first-generation American youth who have experienced violence and trauma, the ArtForce Iowa staff team recognized in 2017 that they were not doing everything they could for themselves or their students. That is when Executive...
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Building a Resilient Community (United Way of East Central Iowa)
ACES: Building a Resilient Community Childhood trauma has affected the majority of people in our community. Specific family problems as well as child abuse and neglect (summarized as Adverse Childhood Experience, or ACEs) have been shown...
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Central Iowa ACEs Sets Direction
The Central Iowa ACEs 360 Steering Committee approved a strategic plan and new coalition structure at their June meeting. The strategic plan follows the Spectrum of Prevention framework from the Prevention Institute to ensure a multi-faceted,...
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Child Health Funding Announcement
Funding Opportunities to Address Adverse Childhood Experiences Full Proposal Deadline: June 1, 2015 Community-based organizations and other non-academic agencies are invited to submit proposals that aim to implement an evidence-based program that...
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Child’s behavior may be linked to parent’s adverse childhood experiences [contemporarypediatrics.com]
Parents who have experienced adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), such as abuse, neglect, or household dysfunction, are more likely than parents without these experiences to have children with behavioral health problems, according to an analysis of data from several large, nationally representative surveys of US households that addressed ACEs and children’s behavioral problems and diagnoses. Of the more than 2500 children for whom researchers had data, one-fifth had a parent who reported...
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Continued Advocacy on ACEs Priorities
The Iowa ACEs Advocacy Coalition has worked diligently all session to promote legislation that will improve the well-being of children and families in Iowa. In partnership with advocates around the state, the coalition is currently promoting a few key...
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Coordinating Iowa's Response to ACEs
On Tuesday, June 16, leaders from across the state came together to discuss statewide collaboration in responding to adverse childhood experiences. Representatives from statewide public and private entities as well as local trauma coalitions joined...
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Eradicating the roots of childhood trauma [indianapolisrecorder.com]
On the east side of Indianapolis in late March, a barrage of bullets sprayed through a home, killing 1-year-old Malaysia Robson as she slept on the couch. It was a drive-by shooting in the middle of the night by two men in their late 20s. It’s the kind of violence that can shake a community, leaving its distraught members wondering how much more they can take. Community violence — and other forms of trauma — are especially harmful for children. They’re called adverse childhood experiences...
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Farmers Wash Up ‘in a Fragile Place’ After Historic Midwest Floods (pewtrusts.org)
If you need help, call the 1-800-FARM-AID hotline. In the weeks after flooding drowned the livelihoods of families who’ve farmed along the Missouri River for generations, rural advocates in the Midwest began gearing up for another crisis. The devastating floods increased concerns about the mental health and well-being of farmers who already were struggling with yearslong economic uncertainty. Groups in flood-affected states such as Nebraska say they are preparing to provide mental and...
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From Awareness to Action, with Voices of Lived Experience: Wisconsin’s Collective Impact Initiative
Perhaps it wasn’t the optimum time to update the network’s vision and values statements: a virtual meeting held in the midst of a global pandemic. But a record number of people—51, compared to the typical 30—tuned in for the May 1 Wisconsin Office of Children’s Mental Health (OCMH) Collective Impact Council, and they gave the new values statement, which highlights inclusivity and collaboration, an enthusiastic thumbs-up. At the virtual table were members from key state departments—Children...
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Harvard Infographic on ACEs and Toxic Stress
This was just posted by Harvard. I thought all of us could use access to it, for use in our schools and the settings we work in. The full image is on the attached PDF.
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Healing Trauma From a Yoga Mat [iowapublicradio.org]
By Charity Nebbe, Katelyn Harrop, and Sthefany Nobriga, Iowa Public Radio, January 8, 2020 The impacts of trauma can be unexpected, affecting not only mental and emotional health but also physical well being. Through Trauma Sensitive Yoga, a modified yoga practice that prioritizes a healthy realtionship with one's body and similarly informed tai-chi programs, some survivors have found a new kind of relief. On this episode of Talk of Iowa, host Charity Nebbe talked with Matthew Vasquez, an...
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Iowa ACEs Advocacy Coalition
The advocacy efforts in Iowa to address ACEs and the impact of trauma have been coordinated by the Iowa ACEs Advocacy Coalition. This coalition is co-chaired by Sarah Ramsey from United Way of Central Iowa and Mary Nelle Trefz from Child and Family...
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Iowa ACEs Report
The Central Iowa ACEs 360 Steering Committee has led efforts to research how adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) impact the health and well-being of Iowans throughout a lifetime. In 2012, questions were added to the Behavioral Risk Factor...
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Iowa District focuses on students' passions (hechingerreport.org)
Trace Pickering, associate superintendent of the Cedar Rapids Community School District, founded Iowa BIG, a district program that gives students an alternative to the traditional school day. The district, located about two hours’ drive northeast of Des Moines, is the second largest in Iowa (after Des Moines), with more than 17,000 students. And parents had to be convinced that it was worth trying something new because schools there already had a good reputation. The district’s students...
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Iowa project aims to have all pediatricians, family docs screen for ACEs
Dr. Amy Shriver is on a mission: to convince every pediatrician and family doctor in the State of Iowa to screen children for Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs). Dr. Amy Shriver The Des Moines-based Blank Children’s Hospital pediatrician is not alone. She’s part of Central Iowa ACES 360, a regional cross-sector coalition formed in 2011 that is working toward that ambitious goal. And they’re making substantial inroads. Central Iowa ACES 360 has just developed a one-hour trauma-informed...
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Iowa's Taste of Success
ACEs Connection recently posted a link to a great new resource, The Co mmunity Resilience Cookbook . We know that ACEs and toxic trauma can be powerful determinants of our fu ture health and well-being, but they DO NOT HAVE TO. This cookbook looks at...
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Jones: Day 2: Soda, cigarettes and trauma: How Adverse Childhood Experiences alter brain chemistry, cultivate unhealthy habits and prompt premature death
Patients would carry soda into Dr. Gerard Clancy’s office, with cigarettes tucked away for after therapy. Often victims of abuse or violent crime, they would seek soothing but risky behaviors to cope. Overweight. Chronic pain. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Type II diabetes. His former patients will die younger than they should, he said. Clancy conducted therapy sessions until he became president of the University of Tulsa in 2016. At his psychiatry clinic, he saw firsthand how a...
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Lack Of Portable Insurance Adds Health Care Burden To Migrant Workers (iowawatch.org)
Farmworkers who spend their summers in Iowa often come from southern states such as Texas, with employers like Monsanto, whose migrant season is from June to October. The peak is in June and July during which more workers are needed. Health insurance coverage for migrant workers who are U.S. citizens with Medicare transfers no matter the state in which a patient resides. But U.S. citizen workers with low incomes, and with Medicaid coverage, have limited access to health insurance while...
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NAMI Day on the Hill
Members from Central Iowa ACEs 360 and the Iowa ACEs Advocacy Coalition participated in NAMI-Iowa's Day on the Hill, educating on the impact of childhood trauma on the long-term health and well-being of Iowans. ACEs representatives specifically...
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NEST works to help new parents in Appanoose County (IA) [DailyIowegian.com]
The Appanoose County NEST program has been under the guidance of coordinator Meho Clark for about three years and has been growing steadily. The parent education and support group began about five years ago at SEIDA, but has since moved under the control of Clark at the ISU Extension Office where it currently serves about 60 families and 100 children. The program serves anyone who is pregnant or with a child under five. There are not other restrictions on who can participate. Families can...
Comment
Re: Iowa House Presentation on ACES
So far this session, we have been focused on the committees that oversee health and human services programs and appropriations. We have been fortunate to be invited to present by the chairs of each of these committees, after sharing information with the chairs and legislative staff leading up to session. This work has been led by our policy co-chairs, and they continue to educate throughout the session. We also hope to interact more with the education committees as well.
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Local Affiliates Accelerate ACEs-and-Resilience Movement in Montana
In Toole County, Montana, deputy sheriffs call a school counselor, from their patrol cars, after responding to a traumatic incident—a domestic abuse call, an overdose, an arrest—that involves a child. “Handle with care,” they tell the counselor, and they give the child’s name. The counselor passes that information to teachers: a quiet heads-up that the student might be hungry or sleepy, tearful, angry or distracted by whatever happened at home. “My teachers love it,” says Mary Miller, chair...
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California reaches milestone with ACEs initiatives pulsing in all 58 counties. Next: All CA cities.
Karen Clemmer, the Northwest community facilitator with ACEs Connection, was already deeply interested in the CDC/Kaiser Permanente Adverse Childhood Experiences Study when she and a colleague from the Child Parent Institute were invited to lunch by ACEs Connection founder and publisher Jane Stevens in 2012. But that lunch meeting changed everything. Karen Clemmer “Jane helped us see a bigger world,” says Clemmer. “She came with a much wider lens. She didn’t look only at Sonoma County, she...
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New Iowa ACEs Module
Iowa ACEs 360 has launched a free online course, Healing Iowa: An Overview of ACEs in Iowa and How to Respond. This interactive online learning module takes about an hour to complete and covers the following: Iowa research about adverse childhood experiences and how trauma impacts health and well-being. Factors that contribute to childhood trauma Ways that Iowans are responding to trauma. When the course is complete, participants will receive a certificate of completion. The course can be...
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Advocacy for Iowa's Families
The 2021 Iowa Legislative Session kicked off last week at a time when the needs of families are great. The pandemic and the inequities it furthers for low-income Iowans and Iowa communities of color and the systemic discrimination that continues to disenfranchise our neighbors all mean we have much work to do to create systems that prevent trauma to Iowa’s children and families. Over the past few months, Iowa ACEs 360 has partnered with local coalitions and organizations to hold advocacy...
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Measuring Equity Through City Trees (yesmagazine.org)
The term “urban forest” may sound like an oxymoron. When most of us think about forests, we may picture vast expanses of tall trunks and dappled sunlight filtering through the leaves, far from the busyness of the city. But the trees that line city streets and surround apartment complexes across the U.S. hold great value, in part because of their proximity to people. “Per tree, you’re getting way more value for an urban tree than a tree out in the wild,” says Mark McPherson, founder and...