Institute on Fostering Resilience

The Institute on Fostering Resilience is a partnership between Pediatric Forensic Medicine (PFM) and the UK Center on Trauma and Children (UK CTAC). 

The overall mission of the Institute on Fostering Resilience (IFR) is to provide a continuum of evidence-based programming to address the needs of children and families involved in out-of-home care, and to support the systems responsible for serving them. The institute takes an evidence-to-action approach, ensuring that the outcomes most relevant to those involved are privileged and achieved through its programming. To that end, translation research activities are embedded at each programming phase to determine efficacy, effectiveness, and utility and to allow for real-time adjustments consistent with the latest quality improvement standards. 

Kentucky has experienced some of the highest rates of child maltreatment in the country for over a decade.  As the flagship institution in the state, UK has been a leader in addressing this by serving children experiencing child abuse and trauma through identification, intervention, innovation, and research.  The Kosair for Kids Center for Safe and Healthy Children and Families opened in March of 2024 and is the largest evaluation and treatment center for suspected child maltreatment in the state. The Center on Trauma and Children established in 1999 is the only program in the state to develop and disseminate knowledge, technologies and evidence-based practices that eliminate the need for out of home care; that is, reducing and ending violence against children, and the effects of trauma on children, families, systems and the workforce.   The two programs work together on the spectrum of treating victims; however, children in out-of-home placement continue to have substantial challenges in the state.