ALCANLink

Contact ALCANLink:

Jared Parrish, PhD
Senior Epidemiologist
907-269-8068

MCH-Epidemiology Unit
3601 C Street, Suite 358
Anchorage, AK 99503

Data & Reports

Data

A variety of factors can contribute to elevated risk of maltreatment and subsequent involvement with child protection. Some populations have a disproportionate number of these factors resulting in increased contact with child protection and differential lifetime trajectories for optimized health and development. Children born into families that are low income, single parent households, families with a history of substance abuse or history of violence, and/or families experiencing multiple forms dysfunction are at an increased risk of being reported for maltreatment during their lifetime. Lifetime contact with child protection is also differential by race in Alaska, with Alaska Native children being 3 times as likely to be reported before age 7 compared to White children. However, if we take into account the aforementioned factors, race differences largely disappear, thus race doesn’t define risk, rather the disproportionate load of factors that are modifiable and preventable.

Cumulative Incidence:

Before the age of 10 years:

  • 38% (1 in every 2.6 births) of children born in Alaska will be reported to Child Welfare
  • 31% (1 in every 3.2 births) of children born in Alaska will be screened in by Child Welfare
  • 13% (1 in every 7.7 births) of children born in Alaska will be substantiated by Child Welfare
  • 7% (1 in every 14.3 births) of children born in Alaska will be removed by Child Welfare

The cumulative incidence measure is the risk of a specified event occurring among a population during a defined time interval. This measure describes the risk over time and can be assessed at any duration. To estimate the cumulative risk of child welfare events at any age during our observation window we calculated one minus the survivorship that was derived using an Aalen based hazard approach.

The cumulative incidence displays the probability of experiencing the specified outcome by a given age among those born in Alaska during 2009 – 2011. These estimates can be extrapolated to all births during any year with the understanding that changes in reporting, recognition, and other factors may result unaccounted variation.

The link below provides the cumulative incidence estimates in Alaska and describes these estimates by various demographic or other factors. This site is in development, and additional information and improvements are being made.

https://ak-mch-epi.shinyapps.io/ALCANLink/

Reports