ABSTRACT
BETWEEN 1990 AND 1994, Candice Schachter, a physicaltherapist, worked as a volunteer in a community-based sexual assault center. She served as a lay co-facilitator with a professional social worker providing group support for women survivors of childhood sexual abuse (CSA). In this role, Candice listened to women talk about the difficulties they experienced when seeking health care. Some talked about being afraid to consult a health professional (HP) because they anticipated not being able to tolerate the examination and treatment processes. One woman talked about going to a practitioner on one occasion and having such a negative experience that she could not return. Candice recognized that physical therapists and other HPs, trained to focus on the health of the body rather than on mental health, had not been taught that CSA could have this kind of impact on survivors’ abilities to access health care. The result was a series of collaborations, one of which is the subject of this chapter. In particular, we focus on qualitative research aimed at describing male and female CSA survivors’ experiences with health professionals. Our aims were to listen to and learn
from survivors about their experiences with HPs and to collaborate with both survivors and HPs to identify principles of “sensitive practice.”
