I recently had a friend call me about his niece, within a few months her b/f separated her shoulder, gave her a concussion and blasted her eardrum. Her mom found her drunk laying on railroad tracks. I would have assumed the ER would have reported this pattern of injuries. I don't have a lot of experience in this area, so I told him to call the Domestic Abuse hotline and get information and counsel from them. The next day the local morning paper reported that my County is cutting all subsidies to local non-profits in the budget, added to the State and Federal budget cuts. That afternoon, my friend called back. He said the hotline gave him a busy signal all morning; he looked up all the township hotlines and after calling 7 different ones, he finally got through to the 8th number he called. He is grateful for the information.

However, especially during this Holiday season, if you need help and are having a hard time finding it, keep trying, don't just give up on the 10th busy signal. You need to take care of yourself, because you are worth it.

call victim / witness then the police. breaking up with him is also a good start. Most YWCAs have services for battered women also - condolences

Domestic violence is a two person issue though. A lot of times the woman will intentionally put herself in harm's way "out of love." A lot of times intervention will only get you into more trouble. And where drugs and alcohol are involved... GOOD TIMES!

Most of the times the person doing all of the hitting needs to be beaten into submission so they get the point violence begets violence.

Humans just suck...

I had a friend whos husband lost it.
We told her to leave. She did for one night.

Couple months later, he sliced and diced her in front of the gas station she worked at. She died with the first stab. He added a dozen more just for good measure.

She always said, "I'd leave him but, I love him."

Whatever makes you think an emergency department can even be aware of a "pattern of injuries"? Emergency medicine is the epitome of NON-integrated healthcare. The doctors rotate through and there's no coordination with the patient's regular physician--not to mention that a lot of people in the ED don't even have regular physicians. Even if they suggest followup to the patients, they have no way to know if it ever happens.

People assume that healthcare records are all integrated these days and their doctor can find out anything just by looking it up, but that is absolutely NOT the case. Partly that's because of HIPAA (the patient protection act) but another large part is just technical, in that software programs for various hospitals and practices don't even recognize each other's data. Not to mention all the smaller private practices that may not even have digital records yet because of the cost and inconvenience.

I wish the people who want government services to be cut back even more than they already have been could understand that your story is exactly the problem they are advocating. Suppose this had been an emergency situation for the girl? Would spending an entire day making phone calls to "hotlines" (obviously barely warm, if that) be acceptable?

Your friend's niece is lucky she has such a caring uncle, and he's lucky to know you. I hope she gets the help she needs.

Blaming the victim is so much fun. . .

Studies show that a woman will leave an abusive partner 7 times, after which she either has left him for good or has resigned herself to stay. It is more difficult when these types of guys isolate them from their friends and family.

Here in Pennsylvania, there is also a big stink about hotlines after the Jerry Sandusky case. After budget cuts, they realized they don't have enough people manning Child Abuse lines. This is how it goes-cut the budget-something bad happens-struggle to fix.

NO NO NO NO NO NO NO YOU JUST DIDN'T!


First of all I have four customers of mine who are all FULL BLOWN RNs. One's specialty is Pediatric, another one is geriatrics, and the other two work for hospitals as general RN's usually split between filling in for the ER or serving during Surgeries. My mom retired as a Cardiac, Burn, and trauma nurse and she was a volunteer firefighter and volunteer paramedic. They have all seen people come and go from the hospital and abuse does show a pattern in the ER. My own mom had to call the police on one woman who kept coming in with broken bones and lacerations and all came with thin excuses as to why she got hurt. A game at my mom's hospital with the medical staff was "Spot the tweaker." If you know what to look for you can spot a drug addict a mile away! ALL of these people have witnessed patterns in people's behavior. And for a woman to come into the same hospital five times in four months all with the exact same injuries and all with different and weak excuses as to why they keep coming in hurt makes the hospital itself call in and have the situation looked into, ESPECIALLY WHERE CHILDREN ARE CONCERNED.

A hospital is under legal obligation to report certain injuries. Gunshots, gang violence, stabbings. They even have to report industrial accidents to CAL OSHA. If a child is brought in with mysterious bruises you can bet they have a councilor at the hospital speak with the child. THAT IS STANDARD OPERATING PROCEDURE.

Now, since my mom was involved with the Law Enforcement community in Oregon (And you an bet any given paramedic knows at least half of a given police force in an area they serve) I have heard a lot of horror tales of their Domestic Disturbance calls where he is beating the crap out of her when they arrive and the moment they separate them SHE turns on the cops. One friend of mine had to be saved when he tried to split a couple up who was fighting with each other and her BF had the upper hand. All he tried to do was get them to stop fighting and instead had BOTH OF THEM turn on him. I hit the guy with a loaded trash can. Another friend of mine went toe to toe with the woman. The guy backed down when he was facing me and the guy he and his GF were beating up. I was in a mood then to draw blood and hitting him with a trash can did take a lot of steam out of his sails. And then came having to deal with the EFFING police. The three of us ALMOST went to jail for one of us trying to be a good Samaritan.


NOW for another fact. My last GF was a MFT (Marriage and Family Therapist.) If she even SUSPECTS violence she must contact certain agencies and an investigation begins to insure there is no violence. If there is clear evidence of violence she MUST CONTACT THE POLICE FAMILIES UNIT AND SOCIAL SERVICES.

Most of this crap goes on under the radar in RELIGIOUS INSTITUTIONS. THAT IS A DIRT BELOW OUR FEET FACT!!! I grew up in a house fraught with emotional and physical violence. My father was extremely abusive. Had I been in Public School and they would have caught on to his crap he would have been in jail. But even with BLATANT SIGNS of abuse my grade school let a lot of his BS slide under the radar. My father even GAVE THEM PERMISSION TO INFLICT CORPORAL PUNISHMENT ON ME IF THEY FELT IT NECESSARY! Guess what, they felt it was necessary quite a lot! Even the principle "spanked" me more than once!

I was the victim and blamed for a lot of crap I had no power over and things I never did or stuff that was the result of violence against me. Imagine being the poor kid being told by his own father that, "YOUR BIRTH FUCQED MY LIFE UP." And then having to hear your own teachers tell you, "But he is your father. He loves you. He doesn't mean it," the day after he wailed the crap out of me with a rubber hose for some BS reason. I lived the nightmare most of you only hear about. I know others who had it far worst than me too.

The problem is you are damned if you help and damned if you don't. The last time I heard a father say the very words my own father said to me Bad Andy came right out to play and I wanted "Daddy's" azz something fierce. I made a man taller than me almost fall backwards into produce in a grocery store just demanding the man take the first shot at me so I could just plain give him a dose of what he had coming. I also had two elderly women henpecking the man from behind me how he could say such cruel and horrible things to his own kid. I mean the kid had to only be 8 years old. I wanted to tear into that man like he was my own father. and instead he was a FUCQING COWARD! People are SO brave when they have to intimidate someone a 1/4 their size! That was MY father.

I am sorry but the sad thing with Stereotypes is that people live up to them most of the time!