Child & Adolescent Addiction, Mental Health & Psychiatry Program (CAAMHPP)

Alberta Health Services

Stress, Resilience, Social Policy, ACEs, Service Delivery, Trauma-Informed Care, Brain Architecture

Alberta Health Services, November 2016

The original Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE) study (Felitti et al., 1998) was initiated by Drs. Vincent Felitti and Robert Anda specialists in preventive medicine at Kaiser Permanente Health Management Organization in San Diego and the US Centre for Disease Prevention. Felitti and Anda composed a ten (10) item questionnaire, from multiple sources/existing measures, in order to survey members of the Kaiser Permanente health plan. Although there are others researching the area of adverse childhood experiences, such as child abuse/neglect (e.g., Trocme, Finkelhor, Perry), the nature and size of the data-set established by Felitti’s group was able to establish a strong association to health and mental health outcomes. This combined with the group’s effective health promotion prevention initiatives have brought ACEs into the forefront of health professionals, educators and child welfare specialists.


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