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S073-2

Approaching Clinical Translational Research: Adverse Early Childhood
Experience as a Driver of Mental Disorders and Other Serious Illnesses –
Experimental and Cohort Studies

Andrew Greenshaw

University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada

Content: The pioneering work of Vincent Felitti and Robert Anda has pointed clearly at adverse
early childhood experience (ACE) as a determinant of increased risk for mental illness, and other
serious diseases including diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular disease and cancer (see
www.acestudy.org). This phenomenon will be used as an example of a broad focal area for clinical
translational work. Consideration will be given to the possibility of examining the relationship of
ACE to epidemiological findings and to examining possible mechanisms whereby the consequences
of ACE may influence mental health through direct behavioural and indirect epigenetic influences.
The work of the author and colleagues on current longitudinal cohort analysis with a sample of over
3000 mothers and babies will be discussed. This current cohort study, PURLS, will be outlined as a
key example of using a prospective approach, particular emphasis will be placed on maternal
depression as a determinant of subsequent mental health.