SAFE Sends Community Member’s to the Iowa Drug Endangered Children Conference

This year the annual Iowa Drug Endangered Children Conference will be held in Des Moines on March 30^th.  Drug Endangered Children (DEC) are part of a very large and growing population of children whose lives have been seriously and negatively impacted by parental or caregiver abuse. Hundreds of children across Iowa go unnoticed and do not receive the necessary intervention and care to heal from these abusive environments. The purpose of this conference is to provide the best practices in identifying and caring for drug endangered children.

 This conference is intended for professionals who work with drug endangered children and their families including those from law enforcement, human services, prosecution, healthcare, mental health, substance abuse treatment and prevention, child development and education.  It is to enable the learner to use best practices to identify and care for drug endangered children. At the completion of the training community members will be able to: Describe the structural and functional changes that occur in the developing fetal brain when a woman uses drugs and alcohol during pregnancy and identify the relevant, current national drug trends including the growing trend of synthetic drug abuse.  The breakout sessions will offer a variety of options for additional education and will enhance participants’ understanding of:  The medical and neurobehavioral consequences for the newborn infant prenatally exposed to illicit drugs;  The core elements of family drug court practice;  How to incorporate evidence-based and promising practices into the services they currently provide;  Different types of drug tests that are now available; and the eight phases of EMDR therapy for children, adolescents and adults.

There will be one coalition member and two Parents as Teachers staff members attending this conference this year with support from the coalition.  For more information on the Iowa DEC Conference or local prevention work being done by the SAFE Coalition please contact the coalition at 319-293-6412 or info@vbsafecoalition.com