What is the ASCSA CARE Collaborative?

Since 2016, Wings has been assessing the needs of adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse, examining access to care issues and opportunities for this underserved population, beginning with a partnership with the Colorado School of Public Health and Colorado Office of the Attorney General. Public health data we gathered at the state level points to many systemic barriers adult survivors chronically face when trying to get into and through services to address a history of childhood sexual abuse. 

Benchmarking breakthroughs 

For decades, protocols have existed to help identify and respond to the trauma of childhood sexual abuse in the lives of children who are victimized. The Children’s Advocacy Center response was launched in one community and has now been scaled internationally. Similarly, for adults who experience sexual assault in adulthood, protocols have been developed to coordinate the care they need between the hospital, local sexual assault service providers and the criminal justice system when survivors choose to report. The Sexual Assault Response Team (SART) and Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner (SANE) protocols have helped more survivors of recent sexual assault come forward and have access to services they need to heal.  

Centering Adult Survivors’ Needs 

Adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse do not fit into these existing protocols. The abuse they experienced was in childhood, yet they are now adults. There is rarely forensic evidence to collect for adult survivors, yet the evidence is contained in the symptoms with which they now present, in the memories they carry and in the trauma they still need sufficient support to resolve.  

What Does ASCSA CARE Stand for? 

Our ASCSA CARE Collaborative centers CSA trauma as an individual, family and community health issue. It was developed with the guidance and expertise of a Statewide Task Force of survivors, loved ones and professionals with expertise working with adult survivors. It provides key community and survivor education and outreach, core provider trainings on how to screen, refer and treat this trauma, and how to coordinate care to ensure “no wrong door” for adult survivors who present to any participating provider. The model can be adapted for use in any local community that wants to support adult survivors healing. It will take broad participation and support from all of these groups to restore our communities and the lives of everyone in them who have been impacted by CSA trauma. 

Piloting an ASCSA CARE Collaborative 

We are proud and grateful to pilot our ASCSA CARE Collaborative with the many partners who are part of Porchlight Family Justice Center serving Jefferson and Gilpin Counties in Colorado. We are assessing outcomes and hope to be able to scale this response in every community who would like to implement it, in time.  

To learn how to get “pilot ready” in your community, please reach out to wings@wingsfound.org. 

Healthier futures, lives and relationships 

When we transform systems that have denied this trauma, we transform lives of the people who depend upon them. Brighter, healthier futures, lives and relationships are our aim. 

Wings thanks all members of our Adult Survivors of Childhood Sexual Abuse State Task Force for their consistent partnership and collaboration in developing this pioneering protocol.