Tagged With "early childhood"
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Trauma-informed groups rev up to address race, inclusion
Eighteen-year-old Kia Hanson has always enjoyed her time as a youth leader at the East Oakland Youth Development Center (EOYDC). She’s worked mostly with five- and six-year-olds since she began in 2016. Recently, she tapped into new skills, especially if the kids were having a meltdown. Kia Hanson “If they’re off, we ask them, ‘What’s wrong?’ ‘Do you want to talk about anything?’,” she explains. “Basically asking before assuming they’re mad at the world for no reason.” What made the...
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University students seeking counseling learn about their ACEs
Dr. Diane Suffridge, a clinical psychologist and director of the University Counseling Services at Dominican University in San Rafael, Calif., has been interested in trauma for many years. But last summer that interest took a sudden and interesting turn. A student counselor she advised had written a research paper on the link between adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) health and mental health outcomes in foster youth, and it gave the student a new view of the patients she counseled at the...
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Webinar Oct. 17 — Integrating ACEs science in pediatrics: Early adopters share lessons from the field
An ACEs Connection webinar co-sponsored with 4 CA In 2017, California became the first state in the country to pass a law supporting universal screening for adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) in the 5.3 million children in the state’s Medicaid program. As clinicians around California await the state’s announcement of what this new policy will entail, many are wondering what it takes to integrate ACEs science in a pediatric practice. Meet Drs. Deirdre Bernard-Pearl, R.J. Gillespie and...
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4 years after integrating ACEs science, Pueblo, CO clinic improves services for families; cuts ER costs, doctor stress
Four years ago, Dr. Leslie Dempsey would never have talked about ACEs — adverse childhood experiences — with her patients. Now ACEs is a common topic. “Just as I don’t feel awkward asking someone if they smoke or do intravenous drugs, I don’t really feel awkward talking about their childhood traumas in a way that it relates to their health. It’s just integrated into obtaining background and social history,” she says. Dr. Leslie Dempsey Dempsey is a physician in obstetrics who oversees a team...
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ACES Aware Webinar: Dec 13th, 12-1pm PT - Public Comments about soon-to-be-released Request for Proposal
The Department of Health Care Services and the California Office of the Surgeon General are hosting a webinar of the Trauma-Informed Care Implementation Advisory Committee’s Provider Education and Engagement Subcommittee. Subcommittee members will discuss a draft Request for Proposal (RFP) released for public comment as part of the ACEs Aware initiative. The draft RFP invites external organizations to apply for grants to support provider training activities, provider engagement activities...
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ACEs champion pediatricians talk about life and practice in a COVID-19 world
With the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic, healthcare providers everywhere are changing how they care for their patients. I asked a few members of the ACEs in Pediatrics community what they’re doing differently. Dr. R.J Gillespie, pediatrician at The Children’s Clinic in Portland, OR. Dr. R.J. Gillespie Gillespie says that, as much as possible, they’re switching to virtual visits, which allows them “to comfort and reassure our patients face-to-face as much as possible without risking their...
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ACEs gets a day at the (Sacramento) Capitol!
No matter where you are, be sure to follow the events of the day on twitter: Follow @acestoohigh and #4CAKidsDay17 to get live updates all day.
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ACEs Science Champion Series: Dr. Angela Bymaster: This Faith-Based Physician Integrates ACEs Science with Healing Arts
Dr. Angela Bymaster, a family physician at Washington Elementary School in San Jose, CA, operates her clinic in a portable unit on the school property.
Because the unit faces students as they are dropped off by their families, she gets to “pick up the kids” before they are sent to the clinic, practicing “upstream medicine.”
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ACEs screening in CA — a Q and A with Dr. Dayna Long
Last year, the California Department of Health Care Services rolled out its plans for universal screening for trauma among its pediatric and adult Medicaid population. Beginning January 1, 2020, California physicians were able to receive an incentive payment of $29 for each pediatric patient screened for ACEs using the PEARLs ( Pediatrics Adverse Childhood and Resilience Study) tool. Dr. Dayna Long talked with ACEs Connection staff reporter Laurie Udesky about ACEs science, what led to the...
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Berkeley City College group screens Resilience, looks at ACEs through a social justice lens
As far back as she can remember, Berkeley City College Mental Health Specialist Janine Greer understood that there was a connection between adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and health. She had a sense early on that racism figures large in that equation. “Looking around in my community – I’m African American, I noticed that even people who had healthy habits got funky diseases,” she said. “And I’m thinking there must be some sort of health trouble that happens if you’re always stressed.”...
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Building trust is now a critical part of health care
In a video clip , a hospital patient turns away in protest as a physician enters the room. “Why do you all keep coming in my room!” she asks in frustration. The physician moves a chair out of the way and sits down at eye level with the patient. “You’ve had to see so many people,” he acknowledges. “And I’m tired of it!” she yells. “I already know I have to get both of my legs cut off. That’s what they keep saying. I don’t have a choice!” “You don’t feel like you have a choice,” he repeats...
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CA Surgeon General and DHCS Launch ACEs Aware Initiative and Website
Join a live webinar with California Surgeon General Dr. Nadine Burke Harris and Dr. Karen Mark Medical Director, Department of Health Care Services for a Medi-Cal provider introduction to the new ACEs Aware Initiative and the www.ACEsAware.org website. The Office of the California Surgeon General and the Department of Health Care Services (DHCS), in the first public unveiling of the initiative, will host a live webinar to share details of the new ACEs Aware Initiative for Medi-Cal providers...
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Whole People Series & Study Guide (www.pbs.org)
There's a fantastic five-part series, Whole People , done by PBS, " spotlighting the impact of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACES) through personal and community stories. It explores the long-term costs to personal well-being and our society. While much work needs to be done, there are many innovative developments to prevent and treat ACES. We all play a role in becoming a whole people." It's amazing. The five topics covered are as follows: Childhood Trauma Healing Communities A New...
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Why Adults Need Social and Emotional Support, Too [blogs.edweek.org]
"You will be a principal one day and will be blogging about your journey." If I had heard these words early in my career I would have never believed it, but here I am! As the principal of Fall-Hamilton Elementary, a small urban school in Nashville where 70 percent of students come from underprivileged homes and 80 percent are minorities, I get the privilege of high fiving and hugging nearly 320 students in pre-k to 4 th grade, every single morning. I am fortunate to work with and learn from...
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ACEs Science Champions Series: Why this financial coach integrates ACEs-based training
In foreground, Dr. Donielle Prince (l) and Saundra Davis (r) ____________________________ Saundra Davis, a financial coach and consultant who trains other coaches on building resilience among the working poor, knew she had met her partner in helping people deal with their “money disorders” when she first met Dr. Donielle Prince in Sacramento at a black women’s gathering in 2015. Dr. Prince works with ACEs Connection as its San Francisco Bay Area regional community facilitator. She also...
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Youth court banishes blame; leads with ACEs science
YMCA Marin County Youth Court in San Rafael, California In her opening statement, 17-year-old youth advocate Eva advises jurors how to proceed and summarizes her “client’s” good qualities. “As you will see, Julian is genuine, well-spoken and friendly. I recommend asking him about his friends and family, his future plans and his activities outside of school.” (First names only of all minors are used to protect their privacy.) Welcome to the YMCA Marin County (CA) Youth Court, one of 1,400...
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Youth-led community organizing as a tool for building resilience
It started as an answer to a youth-led campaign. Young people in arts programs in San Francisco Bay Area schools had produced spoken word videos about inequities in their communities that helped put them at risk for type 2 diabetes. Dr. Jean Junior The response by their peers was enormous, according to Dr. Jean Junior, who volunteered for the project as a pediatric resident at the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF). “Young people would say ‘You’ve actually gotten me interested.
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"Addiction begins with solving a problem, the problem of human pain, emotional pain"
In his groundbreaking book , In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction , trauma and addiction expert Dr. Gabor Maté writes, “There are almost as many addictions as there are people.” ACEs Connection founder and publisher Jane Stevens read that quote as a springboard to asking Maté to define addiction and explain whether or not it is always rooted in adverse childhood experiences. Maté, along with filmmaker Michelle Esrick and Saturday Night Live star Darrell Hammond,...
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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.
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"A Different Distribution of Power": ACEs, Trauma and Resilience Networks Sharpen Focus on Racial Justice and Equity
For the leaders of Sarasota Strong (or "SRQ Strong") Florida, anti-racism work isn’t about inviting people of color to tables long-occupied by white professionals fluent in academic jargon and theories of change. It’s about venturing, with humility and openness, into spaces where Black people worship, work and live. Helen Neal-Ali from SRQ Strong. Photo courtesy of Andrea Blanch. Which is why, before SRQ Strong even had a name or held a formal event, educator/minister Helen Neal-Ali launched...
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CALQIC Announces Grantees for its ACEs Learning and Quality Improvement Collaborative for 2020-2021 [careinnovations.org]
The Center for Care Innovations and our partners are pleased to announce the grant recipients of the California ACEs Learning and Quality Improvement Collaborative (CALQIC). Led by the UCSF Center to Advance Trauma-Informed HealthCare in partnership with CCI, the California Office of the Surgeon General, and the Rand Corporation, CALQIC is the learning and quality improvement arm of ACES Aware, the initiative led by the Office of the California Surgeon General and the Department of Health...
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CALQIC Announces Grantees for its ACEs Learning and Quality Improvement Collaborative for 2020-2021 [careinnovations.org]
The Center for Care Innovations and our partners are pleased to announce the grant recipients of the California ACEs Learning and Quality Improvement Collaborative (CALQIC). Led by the UCSF Center to Advance Trauma-Informed HealthCare in partnership with CCI, the California Office of the Surgeon General, and the Rand Corporation, CALQIC is the learning and quality improvement arm of ACES Aware, the initiative led by the Office of the California Surgeon General and the Department of Health...
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Child Life specialists empower kids in hospitals, disasters and now the pandemic
In late May, Betsy Andersen’s 7-year-old son, Ezra, had a serious meltdown. He and his six-year-old sister Abby had been enjoying an online Zoom interaction with “Miss Eileen,” “Miss Savannah,” a couple of their colleagues, and a puppet. Betsy Andersen “I could see him trailing off and then he started crying,” says Andersen, who lives in Mundelein, Illinois. But before she swooped in, she heard Miss Eileen talking to him: “She was saying ‘Hey, I see you’re having some big emotions.” Speaking...
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Greater Richmond Trauma Informed Community Network, first to join ACEs Cooperative of Communities, shows what it means to ROCK!
In 2012, Greater Richmond SCAN and five other community partners hatched a one-year plan to educate the Richmond, Virginia, community about ACEs science and to embed trauma-informed practices. Eight years later, the original group has evolved into the Greater Richmond Trauma-Informed Community Network (GRTICN) with 495 people and 170 organizations. And they're just scratching the surface.
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Why the dean of early childhood experts wants to get beyond the brain [centerforhealthjournalism.org]
By Ryan White, Center for Health Journalism, July 23, 2020 Harvard’s Jack Shonkoff, a luminary in the field of early childhood, has spent years showing that events in the earliest years of life have profound implications for how budding brains develop, and in turn, shape a child’s later potential at school and work. Now, Shonkoff says it’s time to connect the brain to the rest of the body. “The message now is to say that there is a revolution going on in molecular biology and genomics and in...
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Coping with Stress During the COVID-19 Pandemic: One-Pager
Coping with Stress During the COVID-19 Pandemic: One-Pager
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Upcoming 4CA Webinar on 8/27/20: The Impacts of COVID-19 on California’s Children, Families, and Communities
The California Campaign to Counter Childhood Adversity (4CA) invites your participation in an upcoming 1.5 hour interactive webinar entitled “ The Impacts of COVID-19 on California’s Children, Families, and Communities ” on August 27, 2020, from 1:30 PM – 3:00 PST that will explore the economic impacts of COVID-19 and how it has affected, and continues to affect, California communities. Featuring a panel of experts, Dr. Flojaune Cofer, Public Health Advocates, All Children Thrive, California...
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Does VP Candidate Kamala Harris know about ACEs? You bet!
Nadine Burke Harris, California’s Surgeon General, has a lot in common with the vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris—Jamaican heritage, surname, home state—and a commitment to addressing ACEs and toxic stress. As reported in the New Yorker article by Paul Tough, “The Poverty Clinic,” Dr. Harris told Kamala Harris, then San Francisco district attorney, about ACEs in 2008 and in response, she offered to help. District Attorney Harris then introduced her to professor of child and...
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California ACEs Academy Event: The Repressed Role of Adverse Childhood Experiences in Adult Well-Being, Disease and Social Functioning: Turning Gold into Lead
Thursday, September 3, 2020 12:00pm - 1:00pm PDT | presented by Dr. Vincent J. Felitti *Priority will be given to Medi-Cal providers* The ACE Study reveals how typically unrecognized adverse childhood experiences are not only common, but causally underlie a number of the most common causes of adult social malfunction, biomedical disease, and premature death. Moreover, it enables one to see that the Public Health Problem is often an individual’s attempted Solution to childhood experiences...
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Introducing the Transform Trauma with ACEs Science Film Festival & Follow-Up Discussions
Transform Trauma with ACEs Sciences Film Festival & Follow-Up Discussions The following weekend watch parties and follow-up discussions are co-hosted by ACEs Connection, The Relentless School Nurse , and The Campaign for Trauma-Informed Policy & Practice (CTIPP) . We appreciated the filmmakers for making these films free to watch for our members and for the public programming of PBS. The films we’ll feature are as follows: Portraits of Professional Caregivers Whole People Part 1...
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Introducing the Transform Trauma with ACEs Science Film Festival & Follow-Up Discussions
Transform Trauma with ACEs Sciences Film Festival & Follow-Up Discussions The following weekend watch parties and follow-up discussions are co-hosted by ACEs Connection, The Relentless School Nurse , and The Campaign for Trauma-Informed Policy & Practice (CTIPP) . We appreciated the filmmakers for making these films free to watch for our members and for the public programming of PBS. The films we’ll feature are as follows: Portraits of Professional Caregivers Whole People Part 1...
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Column: New billboard campaign alerts us to adverse childhood experiences: ‘What is shareable is bearable’ [chicagotribune.com]
By Jerry Davich, Chicago Tribune, September 7, 2020 “Be loving. Be caring. Be there.” These three simple child-rearing reminders can do so much to curtail the barrage of adverse childhood experiences in what can be an abusive, neglectful society. “Adverse childhood experiences,” or ACEs, are defined as emotionally traumatic events that can occur any time before a child turns 18. These situations include divorce, domestic violence, sexual abuse, emotional neglect, parental mental illness and...
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CALIFORNIA ACES ACADEMY: Parental ACEs and Pediatrics: Transforming Well Care [avahealth.org]
CALIFORNIA ACES ACADEMY (CAA) , funded by ACEs Aware, is providing free online training to Medi-Cal providers and others featuring: Practical strategies for integrating trauma-informed health care into your team’s practice that improves patients’ well being and the productivity of your practice. Meet colleagues with experience and success providing trauma-informed health care in their practices. Learn from national and local experts. Talk to other professionals from your region in small...
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Survey for ACEs Connection: PCEs, ACEs, and Health Outcomes
ACEs Connection, we need your help ! We are performing a research study to better understand the relationship between positive childhood experiences (PCEs), ACEs, and health outcomes in adulthood. All we need is 5-10 minutes of your time and your honesty to complete the following anonymous survey. With your help we can find a better way to combat ACEs and to support the development of children into resilient adults. Just a little bit more about the survey: This survey is sponsored by the...
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ACEs & Trauma-Informed Pediatric Care in COVID-19 [ucsfbenioffchildrens.org]
UCSF Benioff Children's Hospitals, Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Portal & Center for Child & Community Health Register now and be eligible for 5 hours of AMA Category 1 CME credit and ABP MOC Part 2 credit. Saturday, October 10, 2020 8am - 3:30 pm Recognizing & Addressing Childhood Trauma - Dayna Long MD Trauma-Informed Care Principles in COVID-19 - Saun-Toy Trotter MFT & Ken Epstein LCSW, PhD Patient Perspective - Jen Leland MFT & Joan Jeung MD Early Adopters Discuss...
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Free Resilience Training for MediCal Providers
Dovetail Learning is offering resilience training for MediCal providers to increase provider resilience to mitigate the affects of vicarious trauma and compassion fatigue that comes with doing the ACEs screening itself. We Are Resilient™ is a research based set of skills for providers and patients to become their most resilient self. Here is the link to register for Part 1 of 2 for a 90 minute training: We Are Resilient™ Training (free to medical providers) in October (date TBD) For a little...
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Prevention is Essential: Collective Impact Coalition Promotes Safe, Stable, Nurturing Relationships and Environments for All Maryland’s Children
When members of Maryland’s State Council on Child Abuse and Neglect (SCCAN) began in 2006 to examine what their state was doing in the realm of prevention, they discovered a gaping hole. Many participants in the 23-member Council—people working in child welfare, mental health, law enforcement and advocacy groups—knew about ACEs and about the corrosive effects of early childhood maltreatment. But they discovered, through informational interviews across different sectors and an environmental...
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NOW AVAILABLE ON DEMAND: The Repressed Role of Adverse Childhood Experiences in Adult Well-Being, Disease and Social Functioning: Turning Gold into Lead (Dr. Vincent J. Felitti) [avahealth.org]
The ACE Study reveals how typically unrecognized adverse childhood experiences are not only common, but causally underlie a number of the most common causes of adult social malfunction, biomedical disease, and premature death. Moreover, it enables one to see that the Public Health Problem is often an individual’s attempted Solution to childhood experiences about which we keep ourselves unaware. A renowned physician and researcher, Dr. Vincent J. Felitti is one of the world’s foremost experts...
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New California preventive mental health coverage puts ACEs science front and center
A mother, frantic with worry, brought her newborn in for a checkup at the pediatric clinic at San Francisco General Hospital. But there wasn’t anything wrong with the baby. And over the next several months, no amount of reassurance could convince the mom that her child was eating, sleeping and growing just fine. If anything, the mother’s worry led to behavior that raised alarm bells for her health care providers. Dr. Kate Margolis “[The family] wasn’t returning calls from the provider, and...
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"A Better Normal" Community Discussion: Suicide Awareness and Community Cafes
Join us on Friday November 6, 2020 from noon to 1:00 PST as we come together and join Satya Chandragiri MD, Bonnie O’Hern RN, Denise PNP, & Michael Polacek RN for a discussion around the tender issue of suicide. Together we will discuss ways people and providers can support each other and encourage communities to take action to support one another around suicide prevention, crisis intervention, and the layers of culture and structural barriers to care. A special emphasis will be on...
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From Wildfires to Childhood Trauma, a Resilience Cooperative Transformed the Way Clinics Face the Unthinkable
What helped Sonoma health center staffers navigate one catastrophe after another was what they had learned about trauma in the Resilient Beginnings Collaborative.
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Amplify Healing Connections
In partnership with the Blue Shield of California Foundation, the Center for Care Innovations (CCI) is launching Amplify Healing Connections , a learning collaborative to strengthen multi-sector partnerships that prevent domestic violence and promote health and well-being for young people and their caregivers. In the context of this program, multi-sector partnerships are partnerships involving organizations across two or more sectors. What We’ll Provide Amplify Healing Connections seeks six...
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Whole People Watch Weekend on ACEs Connection (Dec. 11th - 13th)
The Transform Trauma with ACEs Sciences FREE Film Festival continues this weekend. Please join us to watch parts 1, 2, and 3 of the PBS Whole People series at your convenience, on ACEs Connection, by clicking play on the videos below: Whole People | 101 | Childhood Trauma | Episode 1 (27 min) Preview: Whole People | 102 | Healing Communities | Preview | Episode 2 Whole People | 102 |Healing Communities Episode 2 (27 min) Whole People | 103 |A New Response | Episode 3 (27 min) This is one of...
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Sonoma County field nurses use ACEs science to educate families
Santa Rosa, CA, resident Lisa Marden watches her 15-month-old baby gleefully play with magic markers and relays how she’s been coping with feeling anxious. (We're using a pseudonym to protect the family's privacy.) “I’m just super stressed out with everything, and as soon as I eat anything, I get nauseous, so I’ve been eating snacks instead of meals,” she explains to Liz George, a field nurse with the Maternal/Child Field Nursing team of Sonoma County, CA, who has been seeing Marden on home...
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