Need to ensure that children have the best start in life and live in environments that nurture and protect them from risks
Methods for identifying needs & vulnerability:
Indices regarding Adverse Childhood Experiences (CAE)
offers an important perspective on childhood experiences which are associated with risks to health and wellbeing (this focus has promoted action to address vulnerability in childhood and enabled collaboration at a local level)
However, points of concern are:
there are limitations to the evidence base; therefore they should not be considered in isolation from the much broader body of research on vulnerability and the wider social determinants of health (Asmussen, Fischer, Drayton & McBride, 2020).
limitations and concerns around the use of “adverse childhood experience scores”; using ‘scores’ is inappropriate to identify need and determine thresholds for prioritizing who receives early intervention services (Asmussen, Fischer, Drayton & McBride, 2020; House of Commons Science, 2017).
the adverse childhood experience score approach assumes that each adversity is equally important for outcomes and disregards the specific patterning of these experiences.
Trauma- informed care & trauma- informed services
seeks to recognize that many of those who access a service may have experienced trauma that services do not routinely consider => social exclusion, stigmatization, a lack of support or onward referral, and the potential for re-traumatization (Asmussen, Fischer, Drayton & McBride, 2020)
link between the experience of trauma, sometimes from childhood, and the risk of a range of poor outcomes. For example, research has shown that people who are homeless are more likely to have experienced some form of trauma, often in childhood
Use of multi-dimensional tools that record children’s well-being