Bradley Hasbro Children's Research Center

Thomas A. Roesler, MD

Co-director of Hasbro Children's Partial Hospital Program

Associate professor at theWarren Alpert Medical School of Brown University

Research Interests

Thomas Roesler, MD, is associate professor of psychiatry and human behavior at Brown University and co-director of the Hasbro Children's Hospital Partial Hospital Program for children with both medical and emotional illness. His research interests include the psychological effects of childhood sexual abuse, medical child abuse, and the delivery of medical and psychiatric services in a collaborative day hospital environment.

Selected Research Projects

The family support project for children recently disclosing childhood sexual abuse. This five-year study sponsored by the state of Rhode Island compares a family based crisis oriented response to the new disclosure of sexual abuse with standard available treatment.

Development of evaluation and treatment standards for children who experience medical child abuse. Children hurt by receiving unnecessary and harmful medical care at the instigation of the caretaker can be helped by using normal child abuse treatment strategies. Once the abuse has been identified unnecessary treatment can be stopped with or without the involvement of child protective services.

Outcomes of children treated in a collaborative pediatric/child psychiatric day treatment health-care delivery system. The Hasbro Children's Partial Hospital Program is an innovative approach to treatment of children with both medical and psychiatric illness. Over the past five years more than 600 children with illnesses including diabetes, eating disorders, neurologic difficulties, and gastrointestinal problems have been treated in the intensive, family centered, collaborative environment. We are comparing outcomes of children treated in this program to children receiving community standard treatment.

Selected Publications

Roesler, T.A. and McKenzie, N. (1994). Effects of trauma on measures of psychological functioning in adults sexually abused as children. The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 182(3):145-150.
Roesler, T.A. (1994). Reactions to disclosure of childhood sexual abuse: The effect on adult symptoms. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 182(11):618-624.
Roesler, T.A., Barry, P., and Bock, S.A. (1994). Factitious food allergy and failure to thrive. Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, 148:1150-1155.
Roesler, T.A., Bock, S.A., and Leung, D.Y.M. (1995). Management of the child presenting with allergy to multiple foods. Clinical Pediatrics, 34(11):608-612.
Roesler, T.A., Gavin, L.A., Brenner, A.M. (1995). Collaborative treatment in a tertiary care setting. Family Systems Medicine, 13(3/4):313-318.
Roesler, T.A.,Rickerby, M.L., Nassau, J.H., and High, P.C. (2002). Treating a high risk population: A collaboration of child psychiatry and pediatrics. Medicine and Health – Rhode Island, 85(9):265-268.
Rickerby, M.L., Valeri, S., Gleason, M.M., and Roesler, T.A. (2003). Family response to disclosure of childhood sexual abuse: Implications for secondary prevention. Medicine and Health – Rhode Island, 86(12):387-389.
Roesler, T.A., and Jenny, C. (In preparation). Medical Child Abuse: Beyond Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy, to be published by the American Academy of Pediatrics Press, Elk Grove Village, Illinois.

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