Child Abuse Case Study

t’s in recent years there has been an increased emphasis on dealing with violence and abuse within the UK society in general. Following a focus in the United Kingdom (UK) on child abuse in the 1970s and domestic violence in the 1980s, and in the 1990s the abuse and neglect of older people began to bring up concerns. However, the initial focus of interest was of situations arising in the home settings. More recently, much needed attention has shifted to situations involving institutional settings (Penhale, 2008).

According to Hidden Hurt (2015) Physical abuse can be understood to include any behaviour which causes actual physical harm to the victim, is designed to do so, or it can be a threat to do so. Sexual abuse can be defined as any sexual

Many survivors of physical abuse have reported that the physical abuse started very small, with just a slap or a push, and it will get progressively worse and violent as time goes by. In some cases, there will be no actual violence for years ‘though retrospectively many victims do realise that there was a lot of emotional and verbal abuse ’and it is then a huge shock to the victim when the first assault occurs (Hidden Hurt,

In cases of sexual abuse, the child’s behaviour changes, and that may cause a parent or a guardian to become concerned, although physical signs may also be present. The physical signs of sexual abuse may include bleeding from the genital areas, pain or itching in the genital area, bruising or bleeding near genital area, sexually transmitted disease, vaginal discharge or infection, stomach pains, discomfort when walking or sitting down and pregnancy (NSPCC, 2009). At times the child may have spots of blood on their underwear again which cannot be explained, some children will fail to walk properly because of the pain the abuser has inflicted on