Wellington City Libraries Palm Tree Blossoming of Our Children - Kia Puawai Ngā Tamariki - 10th Australasian Conference on Child Abuse and Neglect

Evolution - a gradual development to a more complex form. Sexual abuse care has slowly evolved over the years but the acknowledgement and evolution of a standard of care for adolescents is reasonably new.


Author

Kathy Lowe, Anne Pearl, Sue Vulger

Speaker

Kathy Lowe

Organisation

Te Puaruruhau

For 7 years now, Auckland has had a dedicated service specialising in the medical based care of adolescent whose lives have been affected by sexual abuse. Our service, Te Puaruruhau , which is part of Starship Hospital but located away from the main site, provides care for children and young people who have experienced some form of abuse or neglect. Te Puaruruhau offers an outpatient service which provides a range of medical and social care. The service is free to our clients. We accept referrals from the community (including self-referrals), schools, statutory agencies, and primary, secondary and tertiary health care providers. We see both males and females up to their 20th birthday. When I look back, our practice has evolved quite dramatically.

We will share the knowledge we have gained from the adolescents we have seen from all socio economic backgrounds, genders and ethnicities. We have used this knowledge to implement a standard of care which is flexible to meet the varied needs of adolescents while acknowledging their particular strengths and resilience.

We believe that the diverse needs of sexually abused adolescents are best served by an experienced, specialised multi-disciplinary team working at a dedicated centre. In such an environment we can attend to the multiple issues and ways in which sexual abuse impacts and work to develop better care for the adolescents. The challenge is to continue to evolve instead of standing still.

Presentation

Paper

Biography

Kathy Lowe is a nurse specialist who has had over 12 years experience in the area of child and adolescent abuse. Initially Kathy worked in Paediatric care and protection but has spent the last 8 years working as a nurse specialist in adolescent sexual abuse and assault care. Kathy has been committed to the development of best practice models in her work with adolescents. Kathy enjoys teaching and training and has a special interest in the myths around hymens and virginity. Kathy has published in nursing journals and has presented at international conferences in New Zealand and Australia.