Psychologically traumatic childhood experiences, such as undergoing verbal or physical abuse, having a battered mother and witnessing domestic violence, living in a household with substance abuse or mental illness, having an incarcerated household member, or having parents who separated or divorced, have long-term health consequences, including raising the risk of premature death. David W. Brown., from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and colleagues analyzed data collected on 17,337 adults who answered questions about their childhood, with the data subsequently correlated to National Death Index data to determine who had died. The team found that children who were exposed to six or more “adverse childhood experiences” were at double the risk of premature death, as compared to children who had not suffered these experiences. On average, the children at highest risk eventually died at age 60, compared to low-risk children who lived to age 79. The researchers observed that: “People with six or more [adverse childhood experiences, ACEs] died nearly 20 years earlier on average than those without ACEs. It is also disturbing that two-thirds of study participants — persons who were relatively well off — had at least one of the ACEs.”
