20 Years of The Mayerson Center | Cincinnati Children's

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Robert Shapiro, MD, Director, Mayerson Center for Safe & Healthy Children: “The Mayerson Center is a facility within Cincinnati Children’s created to evaluate children when there are concerns for abuse and neglect.”

The Mayerson Center opened its door in October of 2000. In the past 20 years, the center has served more than 40,000 children.

Dr. Shapiro: “The Mayerson Center exists because of our dedicated partnerships in the community: the prosecutor’s office, job and family services, police, sheriff—they all come here,. They each play an active role in how we work to keep kids safe”

Andrew Stoll, Detective, Hamilton County Sheriff’s Office: “The Mayerson Center is great because it’s kind of what we call a one-stop-shop. If they come in through the ED, they are referred up here. You’ve got your doctors, your nurses, your social workers. They can be physically examined here. They can be forensically interviewed here. “You have all these people who are here and willing to help, and they get all this information and they give it to me and I sort through everything.”

Safi Syed, Assessments Worker, Hamilton County Child and Family Services: “We want to make sure that child has a voice as well, because at times, I can talk with parents and families and children and I can get one story, or a few pages of story, but it’s not giving me the whole picture.”

Dr. Shapiro: “We really want to find where the truth is, and the information we’re asking about is usually hidden from view. This is not information that anybody freely talks about.”

Kathi Makoroff, MD, Child Abuse Pediatrician: “Officially, we’re the children’s advocacy center for Hamilton County, but we see patients of course from Hamilton County, but also the surrounding counties of Butler Co, Warren Co, Clermont Co, and also the counties in Eastern Indiana, counties in Northern Kentucky.”

From prevention and education to forensic techniques, the Mayerson Center has been a leader in the field of child abuse pediatrics, training fellows who have gone on to run programs all over the country. We continue to learn and innovate.

Dr. Makoroff: “The last 20 years has really seen an explosion in research in this area, and research drives clinical practice. We’re also thinking about how we as providers and the system as a whole can become more trauma-informed.”

April Barker-Casey, LISW Social Worker: “I see the children who come in who have had abuse, or any traumatic experience, not necessarily abuse. “Kids tend to come in here and they’re really anxious. They don’t understand the symptoms that they’re experiencing.”

Using a suite of evidence-based, age-appropriate therapies—offered both in person and via telehealth for families living in more rural counties—we help children heal and families move forward.

April Barker-Casey: “They leave here with a sense of this thing happened and it changed me, but it doesn’t have to end my world.”