Auxiliary

INFANT WELFARE SOCIETY of CHICAGO

Supporting a tradition of visionary care

It’s all about filling the need for an important service -- a need that is great and growing by the day. Child and adolescent counseling is regarded as critical in providing guidance and support to patients, often rewriting troubled histories and pointing the way toward brighter futures. Unfortunately, though, such counseling services for low-income children are sorely lacking in Chicago – and bilingual services are virtually nonexistent.  So, IWS Executive Director Dr. John Wilhelm saw this area as a logical avenue for growth for the Clinic.

Thus began a restructuring and enhancement of our Child & Adolescent Counseling area to streamline services and address the specific needs of our patient population. In terms of restructuring, two areas were combined under one umbrella: Child Development & Support Services (CDSS) that focuses on the developmental concerns of children and their social/emotional issues and Child & Adolescent Counseling Services (CACS) that becomes involved when a diagnosable condition has been identified. Dr. Shiraz Butt, a board certified child and adolescent psychiatrist, is the Medical Director for the newly combined department while Milagros Fernandez serves as its Clinical Director.

The current Child & Adolescent Counseling program has a team of three masters-prepared clinical therapists who provide counseling for pediatric patients: Karen Waanders, Lindsey Petersen and Elizabeth Escobedo. The staff also includes child and adolescent psychiatrist Dr. Marta Benegas who works part-time at IWS. She becomes involved when medication may be necessary for treatment.

Milagros says that integral to the streamlining of our services are state-mandated guidelines that specify a 10-week course of treatment. Given the time frame, each therapeutic encounter must be structured carefully to allow the specialists to address a particular problem effectively. However, if further treatment is indicated, a special request can be made to the state to extend the therapy.

One of the primary goals of the restructuring and streamlining is to reduce the number of patients on our waiting list. In the past, about 35 patients have typically been waiting for treatment through Child & Adolescent
Counseling Services. Several measures have been taken to reduce this number. For example, in addition to the staff members in CACS, our therapists in CDSS are now seeing some of the younger children in Child & Adolescent Counseling. It seems a logical move, as they know the patients and are trained therapists
themselves.

Also with a goal of reducing the number of patients waiting for treatment and continuing to provide services to our core Hispanic and Polish population, the Clinic is assembling a pool of bilingual therapists to augment the work of our staff therapists. These new contractual relationships will allow IWS to extend Child & Adolescent Counseling sessions to the weekends and more settings in the community. Hopefully with the new system in place and a less lengthy treatment time, our waiting list will be reduced significantly and perhaps eliminated altogether.

At this time, about half of our patient referrals come from our medical providers at the Clinic. The other half originates with outside referrals such as clinics that do not offer mental health services, schools or through word of mouth. As our ability to see more patients grows, it is likely referrals from other providers will increase considerably.

Typically, patients range in age from 3 – 18. Clearly, these are formative years in children’s lives, and early intervention is critical in identifying potential problems and addressing them promptly and effectively before they become more serious. That proactive approach has proven beneficial for our patients and their families.

Community outreach has also been a significant component of CACS at the Clinic. In an effort to address the neighborhood’s needs, IWS provided a staff therapist who conducted counseling sessions at the nearby Logandale Middle School. This met with a strong positive response, and the therapist’s time commitment tripled within a year, reinforcing the importance of this service. Although on hold until the program addresses the internal need, a return to providing counseling at nearby schools is possible.

Reflective of our innovative and proactive approach to Child & Adolescent Counseling is the new juvenile probation program. Lindsey Petersen coordinates this effort. She and Karen Waanders see patients either at the Juvenile Justice Building or at their schools. Lindsey says that the program addresses first-time delinquents and offers counseling services to help them stay out of the system and avoid becoming repeat off enders. Thus far, Lindsey and Karen have seen about 15 young people, and they believe intervention at that critical juncture is beneficial.

Given our growing emphasis on bilingual Child & Adolescent Counseling, it is likely that IWS will enhance its reputation as an innovator and leader in the field. And Dr. Wilhelm anticipates that it’s probable that this recognized expertise will create a similar scenario to that which occurred when we began providing dental services at our Halsted Street location over forty years ago. In that case, with the passage of time and as our reputation grew, our dental patients began to come from greater distances to take advantage of the services we offered. IWS became a destination for this particular service for which we were well known and widely respected. He believes this same trend will emerge in the area of Child & Adolescent Counseling.

As the effects of CACS’ restructuring, streamlining and enhancing of services continue to be felt, IWS is enabling more young patients to receive necessary therapy that hopefully will enable them to become well-adjusted and productive adults.

Meet three of our patients . . .

Thanks to our skilled therapists in Child & Adolescent Counseling Services, our patients receive the guidance and support they need to deal with truly challenging circumstances – patients like Sarah, Katherine and Jose. Here are their stories.

Sarah
Sarah was just nine years old when she was sexually abused. She and her family were visiting their next-door neighbors. Sarah went upstairs with her friend, and the girl’s father followed them there. He suggested a game of “hide and seek,” and as Sarah hid in the closet (a perfect location, she thought – her friend would never find her there!), her friend’s dad molested her.

The next day, Sarah’s family noticed how despondent and upset she was. Her older sister asked what was bothering her – and after much prodding, Sarah told her. Her sister immediately informed their parents, and they notified the police. Following their forensic investigation, the authorities attempted to arrest the perpetrator who unfortunately had fled the state.

Of course, Sarah needed treatment following the attack, and she began to see a therapist at IWS. Sarah told her that she didn’t understand why this had happened to her. She wondered if somehow she had done something to encourage her friend’s father. Not surprisingly, Sarah had a fear of men now, and she had difficulty interacting with others. Sleep was a problem as well, as she had frequent nightmares.

After six months of treatment, Sarah is doing much better. Just talking about the abuse helped her, and she came to understand that what happened was not her fault at all. She and her therapist talked about safety skills for the future to ensure Sarah was never put in a situation like this again. And importantly, she understands that the therapists at IWS are there to help her along the way.

Katherine
When they first noticed this about their daughter, Katherine’s parents found it fairly easy to explain. She was just shy, they would tell their friends. She’ll outgrow it. But she didn’t. In fact, her unease in social situations grew, and it reached the point where she was unable to talk at all in public – she couldn’t order food in a restaurant or answer a question in class. She had no friends, and she simply assumed it was because she was unlikable. Although a conscientious student, she refused to make presentations in class. It seemed that she’d rather get an F on a project than speak aloud.

Through therapy, Katherine worked on increasing her self-confidence and assertiveness. She learned coping strategies to manage her physical symptoms of anxiety/panic related to social situations, and she practiced her skills interacting with others in various scenarios. By the time she had completed her treatment, Katherine was able to participate in class, her grades had improved as a result and she was growing more comfortable in her daily social interactions.

Jose
Twelve-year-old Jose confided to his therapist that when he was about 10 years old, he noticed that he felt compelled to count everything around him – from the number of tiles on the wall in the bathroom to the number of cracks in the sidewalk as he walked to school. That compulsion grew, and it began to manifest itself in other forms. He became germophobic, and he felt the need to wash the dishes many times before he felt comfortable using them. The symptoms worsened, and they began to interfere significantly
with his functioning at school, with peers and family members.

Jose was suffering from obsessive/compulsive disorder, and he began to receive treatment through Child & Adolescent Counseling Services. Thanks to therapy and medication, Jose has begun to relax and eliminate some of his fixations from his daily routine. School life has improved, as has his social life and his interactions with peers and friends. It’s a long road back to normalcy, but Jose has begun to take those all-important first steps in gaining control of his life.