About The Chadwick Center for Children and Families

Empowering a world where children and families are healthy and free from abuse and neglect

Rady Children’s Hospital’s Chadwick Center for Children & Families believes that every child and family has the right to be safe and supported after experiencing a distressing or traumatic event to help them move toward healing.

As the largest children’s advocacy center in San Diego County, the Chadwick Center plays a critical role in the County response to child abuse and neglect through coordination of the San Diego County Child Victim-Witness Protocol and the weekly Child Protection Team. They support child abuse investigations by conducting forensic interviews and medical exams when a child is suspected to have experienced sexual abuse, physical abuse or other types of traumas. The Chadwick Center provides immediate victim support and advocacy to ensure that the child and their non-offending caregivers get access to multiple resources and support services (emergency assistance, safe and stable housing, linkage to short and long-term mental health services).

The Chadwick Center is committed to not only providing exceptional services to the children and families we serve in San Diego County, but in improving the standard of care and education for professionals around the world in the areas of child trauma/abuse and neglect.

It is estimated that one out of four children experience some type of child abuse before the age of 18. An average of five children a day dies from abuse and neglect. In 2021, Rady Children’s Hospital-San Diego staff made more than 2,150 mandated reports of child abuse to Child Welfare Services. There were 3,720 total substantiated cases of child abuse throughout San Diego County in 2021.

The Chadwick Center’s multidisciplinary team, also known as the child protection team, collaborates with caring and trained professionals from law enforcement, child protection, prosecution, mental health, medical, family advocacy and other child advocacy center staff and community partners. They provide specialized services to help children and families heal from abuse and trauma by providing a coordinated, compassionate multidisciplinary response.

As overwhelming as the idea of abuse and neglect is, trauma counseling works. At the Chadwick Center, they provide short- and long-term trauma-focused therapy services to children (0-18) and their non-offending caregivers. The Center’s therapists are extremely skilled at using the most updated evidence-based therapy practices to help children manage their traumatic stress reactions, including nightmares, aggression, depression, anxiety and distractibility, while lowering their risk of depression, self-harm and suicidality.

Child maltreatment is a nationwide epidemic. It is one that we do not talk about enough and that as a society we have difficulty wrapping our heads around. Our natural tendency is to presume that only monsters could harm children – not our neighbors, not our friends and family, and certainly not ourselves. What we all need to recognize is that most child maltreatment is the result of a loss of control, a response to extreme frustration and a lack of emotional reserves — a time in which people react in a way that is uncharacteristic of who they are. This can happen to any one of us at any time. When we finally understand what makes us vulnerable, as individuals and as a community, we can increase support systems and alter the trajectory for children and their families.

In 1975, Dr. David Chadwick and a group of helping professionals throughout San Diego came together to create a better system for identifying and responding to child abuse and neglect. Dr. Chadwick dedicated his 60-year professional career to addressing child abuse and neglect. He was one of the founders of the American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children and served as its second president. David successfully pushed for our society to address all forms of child abuse and neglect, rather than focusing on sexual abuse. In 1985, David founded the San Diego Children’s Hospital Center for Child Protection, which is now the Chadwick Center. He drafted the original model child abuse reporting law and was instrumental in its adoption in California.

We live in a community where kindness and generosity empower us to continue San Diego’s grandest commitment to the children of our community.

The following programs are the best hope in keeping children out of the foster care system while lowering their risk of depression, self-harm and suicidality.

• Prevention Programing: Providing education and coaching to parents who are at risk of abusing their children and at risk for having their children placed in the foster care system.
• Trauma Counseling and In-Home Support: Providing family advocates for in-home parenting education and support for families who are receiving trauma-focused therapy services.
• Parenting Groups: Parenting groups for those involved in the child welfare system helping them understand how their own trauma history impacts their ability to be the parent they hope to be.
• Kids and Teens in Court: Program for children who have experienced abuse and trauma and have been asked to testify in court that provides education on the court process (including a courthouse visit with a judge and bailiff) and techniques to minimize the anxiety related to court testimony.

The essential services delivered by the Chadwick Center can only exist through the power of grace, understanding and support that has been the hallmark of the Charity Ball’s support of Rady Children’s Hospital. Your philanthropy will support these and other programs that keep the Chadwick Center at the forefront of helping these children with trauma.

For More Information www.chadwickcenter.org