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Hello Parents, Caregivers and Educators

A message from Stephen Lauer, MD, PhD, Associate Chair at Department of Pediatrics, University of Kansas Health System:

As I reflect on my medical training and career, the biggest shift I have seen is the move from controlling physical disease to promoting mental health. Pediatrics has been remarkably successful at curbing the ravages of infectious diseases, due in large part to the amazing success of vaccines and antibiotics. The decline of these acute diseases has allowed/forced us to shift to considering the behavioral and developmental aspects of child and adolescent health. In and of itself, this is a remarkable achievement but has uncovered the relative lack of training that occurs for most pediatricians in the area of mental health even to today’s medical school curriculum.

This is the healthiest time, physically, in recorded history to be a child. But we are in desperate need of tools to address mental health issues. The long-term effects on physical and mental health caused by Adverse Childhoold Events was not discussed in my training and gets minimal mention in today’s training. Yet, mitigating the effect of ACEs that have already occurred and, even more important reducing the level and severity of ACEs among today’s children/adolescents are the keys to improving the long-term health of our population.

This explains why I have been so enthusiastic about the use of Behavior Checker, an evidence-based tool designed to help parents navigate the challenges of normal childhood developmental in a way that will reduce the ACE score of their children. Along with vaccines, I believe that effective plans to reduce ACE scores in today’s children will have the most impactful effect on improving the long-term health of our children, tomorrow’s adults.

The importance of Behavior Checker is that it is a primary prevention tool; it aims to address the problem before it is a problem, and thus reduce the burden of mental and physical health on our society as a whole and our patients and families as individuals. I believe that this approach will allow for a better, brighter future for our children by teaching their parents how to effectively address the daily challenges of successfully raising children in today's stressful world.

  • Just click on SEARCH ALL BEHAVIORS to get simple, effective teaching strategies that lower everyone's stress. Just to be clear, we are not talking about making sure that your child or grandchild never experiences stress—he’s going to be frustrated, fearful, disappointed, angry and not always get what he wants, for example. We’re saying that your care, support and protection, consistently given...buffering...can mitigate stress so it does not become toxic, a health danger to your child. In short, Parenting is Healthcare.

  • To prevent emotional and physical health problems, parents deserve, and actually need to know, that you are providing the same kind of unconditional love and structure as they do at home every day, hundreds of times a day, about common, but frustrating, behaviors all children do as they test limits and explore their world. And now this information is right here, right now. Pediatric healthcare agrees: It's critical to know how to discipline without hitting, spanking, slapping, threatening, insulting, humiliating or shaming—for everyone who touches a life of a child.

  • It’s convenient, simple to use—search, print and share with your students' families and administrators. That’s the Behavior Checker advice you have right here, right now. What you choose to do every day in response to a child’s behavior from tots to teens actually has more impact on a child's lifelong health, learning and behavior than we ever thought.  In short, Parenting is Healthcare.  The way we treat a tantrum is as important as the way we treat a temperature. How you manage behavior hundreds of times a day is at the core of how you prevent every health crisis we are all dealing with: bullying, obesity, depression, anxiety, heart disease, drug addiction, violence, sexual abuse, cancer, diabetes, and more. For more information about how to bring Behavior Checker to your education setting...

  • Behavior Checker Solutions help you to protect, be a "buffer", against the stress that your employees experience every day at work around parenting.  So that their parenting doesn’t become toxic to their brain, cardiovascular system and immune system, you can provide Behavior Checker as a branded site at work. Research shows that “buffering” stress through this support and caring as an employer, builds executive functioning, self-regulation and other necessary skills to help an adult learn how to be resilient, problem-solve, tolerate frustration, delay gratification, and navigate the ups and downs of life. To help develop the full potential of healthy employees, the healthy Mind S.E.T. of Behavior Checker works! For more information...

The authors and Raised with Love and Limits Foundation disclaim responsibility for any harmful consequences, loss, injury or damage associated with the use and application of information or advice contained in these prescriptions and on this website. These protocols are clinical guidelines that must be used in conjunction with critical thinking and critical judgment.