Archive: November, 2011
Jonathan Purtle, Doctoral candidate in public health. Works at Drexel's Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice
As I described in my previous two posts, the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study discovered that traumatic events – divorce, neglect, domestic violence – are associated with many of the leading causes of death in the United States. While some were skeptical of the initial results, the ACE Study is now in its 13th year, and over 50 publications support the findings. The study is currently in its prospective phase, meaning that the original group of adult participants, whose childhood experiences were examined retrospectively, are now being followed into the future to see how their reports of childhood trauma and adversity are associated with ongoing changes in their health.
So why might traumatic experiences early in life put people at higher health risk? Scientists are not really sure. There are plenty of theories, and most believe that it has something to do with our bodies’ natural stress response systems such as fight-or-flight. As explained by Dr. Sandra Bloom, psychiatrist, expert on trauma, and associate professor at the Drexel University School of Public Health, these systems evolved over millions of years to protect pre-historic humans from threats in the natural world (more on that in a future post). Some also think that it has a lot to do with emotions and feelings of self worth.
Like the original researchers, I was astounded when I first learned of the ACE Study findings. Why, then, have so few people, outside a relatively small circle of academics, heard about it?
Jonathan Purtle, Doctoral candidate in public health. Works at Drexel's Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice
Why were some people – indeed, some of the most successful at slimming down – more likely than others to drop out of a weight-loss program?
The question gnawed at Vincent Felitti, a physician in San Diego, as he looked for a pattern more than 25 years ago. As I described in my last post, Dr. Felitti eventually discovered that a large number of these patients had troubled childhoods — raising questions about if, how, and why psychological trauma in childhood could be connected with poor health later in life.
Felitti, then chief of preventive medicine at Kaiser Permanente, enlisted the help of Dr. Robert Anda — an internal/preventive medicine physician and epidemiologist with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — to develop a study and explore these questions in greater depth. The Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study was born.
Jonathan Purtle, Doctoral candidate in public health. Works at Drexel's Center for Nonviolence and Social Justice
This was the first post by Jonathan Purtle on a recurring topic. Later posts:
- Our adult bodies hold onto childhood pain (Part 2)
- Our adult bodies hold onto childhood pain (Part 3)
- Thinking beyond Penn State . . . childhood sex abuse kills
- Recognizing the longterm trauma of childhood stress. Are WE there yet?
- How to turn 'What's wrong with you' into 'What happened to you?'
- Did childhood kill Kurt Cobain (or Jimi Hendrix)?
By Jonathan Purtle
We like to think that time heals all wounds, but the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study revealed that we carry our history in our bodies—like it or not.
For Inquirer.com. Portions of this blog may also be found in the Inquirer's Sunday Health Section
