Supporting Migrant Children in Pediatric Settings: Lessons Learned from the US Migrant Humanitarian Crisis Response.

This article examines the influx of migrants to the United States and highlights current global and local immigration trends. The authors focus on migrant children-specifically the effect of migration trauma in the context of humanitarian responses to the intentional movement of migrants to Democrat-led cities across the US to humanize the compounded effects of migration trauma, restrictive immigration policies, and the current resettlement landscape for migrants. The authors are directly involved with supporting migrant arrivals who have relocated to Chicago from the southern border, and apply field knowledge to articulate current barriers to accessing health care and best practices within pediatric settings supporting migrant arrivals. Clinical and practice implications for medical providers in pediatric settings are included. The article also highlights the role of interdisciplinary collaboration in providing health care to asylum-seeking migrants and implications for transdisciplinary workforce development in this area. [Pediatr Ann. 2024;53(5):e171-e177.].

Acceptability and initial promise of trainings for community stakeholders serving refugee and immigrant families.

Cumulative traumatic migration experiences are compounded by escalating chronic distress related to the current sociopolitical climate for refugee and immigrant children and families. The aim of this open trial was to conduct a preliminary evaluation of You're Not Alone, a rapidly mounted, strengths-based, community-focused capacity building training initiative for stakeholders interacting with refugee and immigrant children and families in the Chicago area. Trainings, based on Trauma-Informed Care (TIC) and psychological first aid frameworks, adapted education and universal health promotion strategies for population-specific chronic traumatic stress. Two groups of participants (N = 948), who attended either mandatory (n = 659 educators) or voluntary (n = 289 community stakeholders) trainings, completed surveys at pretraining, post-training, and 6-week follow-up. Outcome indices included participant satisfaction, acceptability of training model, and changes in knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors. Over 90% of participants reported satisfaction and acceptability of trainings. For educators, hierarchical linear modeling analyses demonstrated significant increases in trauma knowledge, refugee and immigrant-specific knowledge, positive attitudes toward TIC over time, and a decrease in negative attitudes toward immigrants. Over 95% of participants indicated that they learned and intended to use new strategies to help serve refugee and immigrant children and families. At follow-up, over 80% of those who completed the survey had utilized at least one strategy, and over 55% indicated that they were using resources that they learned about in the training. This study demonstrates that capacity-building trainings swiftly developed and disseminated to community stakeholders can produce positive change in knowledge, attitudes, and practices. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

You're not alone: A public health response to immigrant/refugee distress in the current sociopolitical context.

Recent political events and policy changes in the United States have fueled antirefugee/immigrant rhetoric and an increase of xenophobic harassment and intimidation, which together present a significant threat to the physical and mental health of refugee/immigrant children and families. This article aims to provide an overview of how the current sociopolitical context threatens the public health of refugee and immigrant communities and to describe the role of psychologists in advocating for social justice and responding to this urgent public health need through interprofessional collaboration and translation of scientific knowledge into multilevel intervention development. The case study of the You're Not Alone (YNA) initiative describes swiftly mobilized advocacy efforts (e.g., press conference, webinars, resources development and dissemination) and participatory development and roll-out of community capacity-building trainings to address the needs of refugee/immigrant children and families. Trainings aimed to raise awareness of the refugee/immigrant experience and to equip refugee/immigrant community members and providers across a variety of public sectors to implement culturally responsive and trauma-informed strategies to promote resilience, respond to distress, and prevent mental health crises. Between March 2017 and June 2018, a total of 1,642 individuals attended 48 training events. The role of psychologists in future policy and advocacy efforts to promote mental health among refugee/immigrant families is discussed as well as implications for how other marginalized communities affected by the current sociopolitical climate might benefit from broadening the scope of this public health response. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).