NCJ Number
113763
Date Published
1987
Length
90 pages
Annotation
Based on an interdisciplinary training program conducted at Children's Hospital in Boston, this monograph highlights critical conceptual and procedural issues, the limits of current clinical knowledge and service needs, and gaps between research and practice that effective hospital-based programs for treating family violence, particularly child abuse, must address.
Abstract
Case vignettes illustrate the problems facing family violence service programs, notably traditional emphasis on parental psychopathology as the cause and on the parent as villain rather than another victim. An overview of family violence research covers statistics on incidence, causes of child abuse, its effects children, labeling of certain groups of children as abused, and interventions. A history of the Children's Hospital Program on Family Violence begins with the creation of an interdisciplinary, interagency consultation unit, the Trauma X Team, in 1970 and discusses the subsequent development of a family violence research center, an advocacy program, an outpatient clinic, and a training program. Two key components, funded by Federal grants, are described: the family violence seminar and a fellowship program for pediatricians and behavioral and social scientists. Other program elements examined include the multidisciplinary case conference. Approximately 60 references.