The Center for Collaborative Study of Trauma, Health Equity, and Neurobiology

VISION & GOALS

THEN's  Vision

THEN's Vision is Health, Equity and Justice for ALL
 Research demonstrates the direct connection between Trauma, Chronic Disease, & Health Disparity 
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Trauma

Trauma-Adverse Experience is the direct, personal experience of harm (or threatened harm) to self and others.  Trauma can disrupt Brain-Body Regulation and acts as a root cause of our most pressing health and social problems.  
People seeking medical care have a high likelihood of prior or current Trauma.

Health Equity

Everyone deserves a fair opportunity for physical and mental health.
However, many of us suffer a double dose of adversity (everyday discrimination, structural racism, violence, poverty PLUS individual or household trauma) disrupting Brain-Body Regulation and acting as a root of today's Health Disparity.
New programs show how Health Disparity can be prevented.

Neurobiology

Cutting-edge science:  the best model to understand health and disease is through a systems approach to the unified Brain-Body.
Studying Neurobiology helps us understand how a person's experience affects their Brain-Body and how disruption from Trauma catalyzes dysregulation in the immune and endocrine systems and the gut. 

THEN hopes to help bridge the GAP between the explosion of emerging research and the very slow application of this important science to clinical care.  We believe that medicine and healthcare can develop a rigorous, system-science-based approach that will advance health and health equity.  But so far that hasn’t happened.

RESEARCH:  In the past thirty years, over 100,000 peer-reviewed scientific studies have been published which conclusively demonstrate the neurobiologic connections between Brain-Body, the impact of Trauma including the Trauma of Discrimination, and the potential healing power of restoring Brain-Body Regulation. 

Despite rapid growth of this compelling research:

Medical schools, physician residencies and healthcare training still do NOT include: 
-complex neurobiology
- system science
- or the role of trauma in health disparity.

Minimal innovation to
- put key research findings into action
- develop an expanded understanding of what causes disease
- or re-think current medical and psychiatric diagnoses and treatment

Unfortunately most Patient Care continues to focus on individual diseases or organ systems and
does not address Brain-Body Regulation or disruption by trauma-adversity.

THEN Goals and Strategy

GOAL:  A new medical model to go beyond “controlling” disease to foster true healing. 
Through patient-clinician partnerships, treatment emphasizing foundational Brain-Body Regulation (sleep, emotional peace, supportive relationships, exercise, and more) with a focus on PREVENTION.

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SCIENCE

THEN collaborates with scientists, clinicians, and advocates to build a new, expanded medical model focused on Neurodevelopment and Brain-Body Regulation. 
This new comprehensive framework is urgently needed for people with both complex emotional-physical disease and complex trauma.   

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TEACHING

(1) Highly-rated Presentations:   In the past 5 years, our team has taught 50+ diverse audiences with 7000 attendees
(2) Multi-session Training Courses:  Core Science + Clinical Applications, and 
(3) FREE science education through our Website, Teaching Videos, curated Bibliography, Newsletter, Social Media.

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PARTNERSHIP

THEN is building a Diverse Multidisciplinary Community linking students-trainees, faculty and activists studying Trauma, Equity-Justice, Neurobiology, and System Science. 
THEN also partners with Faculty from Medical Schools and Healthcare Programs to develop curricula.
Our goal is to learn from each other.