How To React if You Suspect a Child is Being Abused

Did you know that in the year 2000, some 879,000 children were found to have undergone child abuse? Every day, children are abused. All states have child abuse reporting laws. A doctor who does not report a child abuse case will get into legal trouble for not reporting it. Some states have a fine of up to $2,000 and/or imprisonment of up to 180 days for failing to report child abuse.

Doctors are obligated to report child abuse, while other health practitioners are also expected to report this whenever they come across cases of child abuse. The following people need to report suspected abuse:

• Nurses, hospital personnel, dentists
• Medical examiners
• Coroners
• Mental health professionals and social workers
• School personnel
• Law enforcement officials
• Child care providers

Abuse can range from sexual abuse, physical abuse, to emotional abuse and neglect. There are several signs or symptoms that indicate whether there has been child abuse. Some of these signs are: being overly knowledgeable in a sexual way for the child's age, drawing sexually explicit pictures, unexplained injuries or burns, bald patches, being scared of physical contact, aggression to other children or even adults, neurotic behavior, sudden speech disorders and many others. But there are also a lot of cases where a child may not show any outward sign that anything is happening since he may choose to keep and hide the abuse from everyone.

There may come a time when you will come across a situation wherein you suspect that there is child abuse. When this happens, what are you going to do? Here are some suggestions on how to react if you suspect child abuse.

1. Seek the advice of the police or the staff and volunteers from the social services. This should be the first step especially if majority of the signs and symptoms of abuse are all present.
2. If you are unsure about the child abuse, you may not go to the police or to social services at once, instead, go and look for a private, non-government organization that supports the cause of preventing child abuse.
3. You can also ask the school's staff for a list of networks or agencies they work with that handle cases of child abuse. They surely keep a list of reliable organizations that are aware of child abuse and have sufficient practical knowledge on how to handle such problems.
4. When contacting official agencies, organizations or groups, be sure to ask what steps they are planning to or going to take to address the problem. It is important that you follow-up the suspected case of child abuse that you encountered and reported.

Child abuse is damaging to children. It is up to the adults who become aware of the situation to do something about it so that the abuse stops. The reality that this actually happens to children is one thing that has to be faced. If this means you have to actively take part in whatever activities or sessions are needed to make sure that the abuse stops, then do so.