{"id":338862,"date":"2018-09-27T10:05:15","date_gmt":"2018-09-27T14:05:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/?p=338862"},"modified":"2022-08-22T13:28:40","modified_gmt":"2022-08-22T17:28:40","slug":"mt-hope-family-center-receives-multi-million-dollar-grant-to-establish-national-center-for-child-maltreatment-studies-338862","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/mt-hope-family-center-receives-multi-million-dollar-grant-to-establish-national-center-for-child-maltreatment-studies-338862\/","title":{"rendered":"Mt. Hope Family Center receives $8 million grant to establish national center for child maltreatment studies"},"content":{"rendered":"
The Ä¢¹½´«Ã½\u2019s Mt. Hope Family Center<\/a> (MHFC), in conjunction with the University of Minnesota\u2019s Institute for Translational Research in Children\u2019s Mental Health<\/a> (ITR), has received a multi-million-dollar grant to create a national center for child maltreatment studies, becoming one of only three academic institutional partnerships in the United States to receive this prestigious award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH).<\/p>\n NIH\u2019s Eunice Kennedy ShriverNational Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) selected the Rochester and Minnesota multidisciplinary team to receive a \u201cCapstone Center on Child Abuse and Neglect<\/a>.\u201d The $8.39 million award over five years will support the center as a national resource for child maltreatment research and training.<\/p>\n The multidisciplinary team will partner with NICHD to create the TRANSFORM Center (T<\/strong>ranslational R<\/strong>esearch that A<\/strong>dapts N<\/strong>ew S<\/strong>cience FOR\u00a0<\/strong>M<\/strong>altreatment Prevention) to prevent child maltreatment and address its consequences. Penn State received a similar award in 2017 and Washington University in St. Louis this year.<\/p>\n \u201cOn behalf of our entire TRANSFORM team, we are honored to be chosen by NICHD as a National Center on Child Abuse and Neglect,\u201d says Sheree Toth, the executive director of the Rochester-based Mt. Hope Family Center. \u201cWe will work tirelessly to advance research, policy, and training initiatives to prevent and address the adverse and lifelong consequences of child maltreatment.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThis is very exciting and well deserved news for the Ä¢¹½´«Ã½\u2019s Mt. Hope Family Center. The creation of this national center will conduct cutting edge research to help prevent child maltreatment and address the long term effects\u201d, says U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. \u201cI supported this critical funding because the research will have far reaching impacts on vulnerable children and families across New York and beyond.\u201d<\/p>\n Each year millions of children and adolescents in the US are reported to child protective agencies for maltreatment such as neglect, and physical, sexual, or emotional abuse. Many experience additional trauma including exposure to domestic abuse, community violence, life-threatening illness or injury, or the sudden loss of a caregiver or loved one.<\/p>\n In 2016, Child Protective Services received referrals involving 7.4 million maltreated children, reflecting a 14.7% increase since 2012. An estimated 1,750 children died that same year due to maltreatment\u2014a rate of 2.36 children per 100,000 in the national population.<\/p>\n The two principal investigators for the TRANSFORM Center are Sheree Toth<\/a>, a URochester professor of psychology and psychiatry, who is also the executive director of the Mt. Hope Family Center, and\u00a0Dante Cicchetti<\/a>, <\/strong>who was the director of the Mt. Hope Family Center before joining the University of Minnesota as theMcKnight Presidential Chair and William Harris Professor at the Institute of Child Development and research director of ITR.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Cicchetti and Toth are leaders in the field of child maltreatment, whose collaborative work spans over three decades, providing a solid foundation for longitudinal and prevention research. They are joined by six project leaders from the Ä¢¹½´«Ã½: Catherine Cerulli<\/a>, professor of psychiatry and director of the University\u2019s Susan B. Anthony Center and the Laboratory of Interpersonal Violence and Victimization; Elizabeth Handley\u00a0<\/a>and Christie Petrenko<\/a>, both research assistant professors at Mt. Hope; Fred Rogosch,\u00a0<\/a>Mt. Hope\u2019s research director; Melissa Sturge-Apple<\/a>, associate professor of psychology and dean of graduate studies in Arts, Sciences, and Engineering; and Jody Todd Manly<\/a>, Mt. Hope\u2019s clinical director. Susan Hetzel, senior scientist at Cicchetti\u2019s UMN molecular genetics laboratory, will be also be involved.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are honored to receive this substantial award from NICHD and thrilled that these resources will enable us to accelerate our delivery of the highest quality research and interventions for maltreated children and families,\u201d says Cicchetti.<\/p>\n The TRANSFORM Center\u2019s research will focus on two areas: the first examines the efficacy of Child-Parent Psychotherapy (CPP) delivered before or after birth to high-risk, impoverished families. CPP therapy, an intensive intervention that focuses on parent-infant relationships for families at risk for child maltreatment, has been extensively evaluated and used at Mt. Hope.<\/p>\n The second is a long-term follow-up investigation of a large-scale Mt. Hope study of risk and resilience in school-aged children. Researchers will look at psychological, immune, endocrine, physiological, and epigenetic processes associated with the early deprivation, trauma, and chronic stress of child maltreatment in relation to possible premature aging, and current physical and mental health in adulthood.<\/p>\n The center is designed to serve as the capstone for research in child maltreatment and as a national resource for the field.\u00a0The community engagement component of the project will train and support young investigators and other key child-serving professionals working with traumatized children and families. Through national collaborations, evidence-based information on child maltreatment will be shared to support the translation of research findings into practice.<\/p>\n Without support and services, child and adolescent victims of maltreatment face the possibility of a lifetime of mental, emotional, behavioral, and physical health problems.\u00a0Abuse and neglect in childhood are related to a host of harmful adult outcomes, such as poor educational and occupational achievement, family dysfunction and domestic violence, major depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, antisocial behavior, substance abuse, as well as obesity, diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, and cancer.<\/p>\n Advancing effective early interventions to promote resilience, and to share the knowledge gained to diverse stake-holders are paramount goals of the new center.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are so excited for the support that MHFC just received and for the great work that will result from this project,\u201d says Gloria Culver<\/a>, the Ä¢¹½´«Ã½\u2019s dean of the School of Arts & Sciences. Research, clinical work, and community outreach \u201chave been a hallmark of Mt. Hope and to now have them recognized by NICHD is affirming and very well deserved.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The new TRANSFORM Center will focus on research, policy, and training aimed at preventing child maltreatment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":942,"featured_media":339562,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[456],"tags":[18612,29502,2036,9186,8466],"class_list":["post-338862","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-society-culture","tag-announcements","tag-featured-post-side","tag-mt-hope-family-center","tag-research-funding","tag-sheree-toth"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nA national problem on the rise<\/strong><\/h3>\n


A capstone for research on child maltreatment<\/strong><\/h3>\n