Cough Drops: $1M grant to study child-abuse injuries

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Astounding as this number is, more than 30,000 Ohio children suffer abuse every year, and in many instances, it starts in the first months of life. That's when abusers often inflict seemingly minor injuries that get explained away.

To study this phenomenon, Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center and five other big children's hospitals in the state have just received a $1 million grant.

Attorney General Mike DeWine unveiled the research money Friday. In a news release, DeWine said, "By studying these injuries in children from zero to six months we hope to detect patterns early in order to help prevent, diagnose, care and treat abused children."

"Sentinel" injuries are tells, like small bruises or oral injuries, that something is wrong with the child's environment.

There isn't much research on sentinel injuries. One 2013 study in the journal Pediatrics on one hospital's experience with nearly 200 abused children found this shocking result: Almost one in three children had a sentinel injury that a health care worker had documented but that did not prompt concern.

The $1 million goes to the Ohio Children's Hospital Association. Participating in the collaborative three-year study along with Cincinnati Children's will be Akron Children's Hospital, Dayton Children's Hospital, Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, ProMedica Toledo Children's Hospital and UH/Rainbow Babies and Children's Hospital in Cleveland. Nationwide is the lead facility.

The study will find the baseline frequency of missed sentinel injuries, develop and share interventions to reduce the likelihood of missing such an injury and to measure the impact of intervention at the sighting of a sentinel injury.