The Department of Pediatrics and Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital are pleased to announce the establishment of the Section of Child Safety, Advocacy & Healing. Andrea G. Asnes, MD, MSW will serve as the inaugural section chief, effective immediately. The new section will establish a separate section for the Yale Programs for Safety, Advocacy & Healing, our comprehensive child abuse programs, previously housed in the section of General Pediatrics.
Yale is home to one of the oldest child protection teams in the country; members of the faculty in pediatrics published a paper describing the team in 1970. Dr. John M. Leventhal, one of the preeminent child abuse pediatricians in the world, expertly led the Yale Child Abuse and Child Abuse Prevention Programs from 1982-2019 and established Yale as a center of excellence for the evaluation and care of maltreated children. In 2019, Dr. Andrea G. Asnes was named the leader of the renamed Yale Programs for Safety, Advocacy & Healing. These programs provide expert evaluation and care of children in the Yale Child Abuse Clinic (also the physical home of the nationally accredited South Central Child Advocacy Center) within Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital and throughout the Yale New Haven Health System. The Yale Programs for Safety, Advocacy & Healing are proud to partner with the Departments of Social Work and Child Life of Yale New Haven Hospital. These programs also include a treatment program for sexually abused children, in collaboration with the Yale Center for Traumatic Stress and Recovery in the Yale Child Study Center, and an innovative Integrated Care Clinic for parents impacted by intimate partner violence co-led by Gunjan Tiyyagura, MD, Associate Professor in the Section of Pediatric Emergency Medicine.
Additionally, team members have established a research collaborative with faculty from multiple sections working together to promote family-centered research in equitable care, child safety, and family healing.
Dr. Asnes holds a master’s degree in social work, obtained her medical degree from the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, and completed her residency in pediatrics at the Mount Sinai Hospital in New York. She was a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar at the University of Michigan. Dr. Asnes is board certified in both general pediatrics and child abuse pediatrics. She joined the faculty at Yale Pediatrics as an Associate Research Scientist in 2005 and was promoted to Professor in 2022. She is a former member of the American Board of Pediatrics Child Abuse Subboard, a current member of the Executive Committee of the American Academy of Pediatrics Council on Child Abuse and Neglect, and current Secretary of the Ray E. Helfer Society (an honorary society of physicians seeking to provide medical leadership regarding the prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and research concerning child abuse and neglect). Dr. Asnes also currently serves as Graduate Medical Education Director of Resident and Fellow Wellbeing and Associate Designated Institutional Official for Yale New Haven Hospital.
Paula Schaeffer serves as the administrative coleader of the Yale Programs for Safety, Advocacy and Healing. Leading the outpatient clinic within the section is Monica V. Madigan, LCSW as the lead social worker and Lisa Pavlovic, MD, Associate Professor, as Medical Director and Deputy Director of Yale Programs for Safety, Advocacy& Healing. Additional members include Beth Moller, DNP, APRN, FNP-BC, Sundes Kazmir, MD, Assistant Professor, John M. Leventhal, MD Professor Emeritus, and James Hamilton, PhD, Associate Professor Adjunct.
Please join us in welcoming our newest section and congratulating Dr. Asnes on this new role!