The psychosocial impact of child abuse: rediscovering the poverty and psychiatric dimensions

Child abuse raises public passion and professional concern, which demands a careful review of the evidence of its longer term psychosocial impact. The field is controversial, compounded by inadvertent 'professional iatrogenes is' involving all disciplines, including general practitioners and psychiat rists. Definitions and the prevalence of 'abuse' are explored and the psych osocial consequences of the different types of abuse, including its extreme s, a murdered child, are reviewed. Evidence is presented for the need for r ediscovering the central importance of the psychiatric and poverty dimensio ns in the child protection interface, which should lead to an integrated, e vidence-based treatment/policy approach that is necessary for child protect ion. New evidence is offered in considering the appropriateness of a 'Megan 's Law' for Britain.