April is Child Abuse Prevention Month.
At Adult & Child Health, we know the value of the continuum of care that our staff are able to provide to our patients and clients. Our comprehensive, wide-ranging services touch the whole health journey, from prevention and outreach to treatment and management/enabling services.
The continuum of care is also crucial in preventing child abuse and working toward creating a safe, healthy, and care-free childhood for every child in our communities. Even the service lines that don’t directly work with youth have the capability to positively impact adults, lifting them up and enabling them to care for the children in their lives in more effective and compassionate ways.
Let’s talk about prevention.
Primary Prevention: Programs and services designed to promote the general welfare of children and families.
Secondary Prevention: Services identified and provided to families who have identified risk factors for maltreatment.
Tertiary Prevention: Services provided after the occurrence of abuse or neglect. These services are designed to prevent the recurrence of abuse.
Most of Adult & Child Health’s services fall under primary prevention. It’s even described in our value statement:
“We strive for equitable, caring communities, where every child, adult, and family have opportunities to live healthy, purposeful lives.”
Our child welfare and wraparound teams play a large role in secondary prevention, with therapeutic foster care and behavioral health/therapy services stepping in to provide additional tertiary prevention.
The ability to focus on upstream efforts to build stronger families is a major positive outcome of Adult & Child’s continuum of care. According to Prevent Child Abuse Indiana, “by focusing especially on primary prevention, we can help mitigate the necessity of the other two.”
A&C provides and links families to crucial supports.
Linkage to supports and services is a significant way in which many Adult & Child teams are creating stronger families. Below are some ways Prevent Child Abuse Indiana recommends that communities can get involved– and where A&C is already working to have an impact.
- Strengthen parenting. Adult & Child Health provides many ways for parents to access support. Different service lines offer education, home visits, and additional resources.
- Respond to family crises. Families can receive additional support when they need it through Adult & Child Health’s Crisis Services, which include a crisis receiving and stabilization center at our Madison Avenue location, a 24/7 mental health crisis support phone line, and a mobile crisis team. Additionally, A&C is the coordinating agency for Safe Place services for youth aged 10-17 in Marion, Johnson, and Monroe counties.
- Link families to services and opportunities. Adult & Child Health strives to be a hub for families to find connections to housing resources, education, health care, mental health and other essential services.
If you or someone you know could benefit from Adult & Child’s services or if you’re interested in learning more, please call our main line at 317.882.5122 or fill out our inquiry form here.
