ven
if he didn’t have six children, Walter Lambert, M.D., would know
when school is out. That’s when the number of calls to the abuse
hotline goes down.
Lambert, associate professor of clinical pediatrics, has headed the Child Protection Team (CPT) for Miami-Dade and Monroe Counties since 1989. As director, Lambert oversees more than 2,000 reported cases of abuse and neglect each year. Teachers and other school workers form a significant percentage of those who report abuse.
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The CPT was established within the Department of Pediatrics 25 years ago. Consisting of a team of pediatricians, nurses, case workers, and psychologists, the CPT assists in the assessment of children and families referred by the Florida Department of Children and Families due to allegations of child abuse and neglect. “Our job forensically is to decide whether something is abuse or not,” says Lambert.
The CPT assesses family and personality functioning, documents physical injuries related to abuse, and determines placement recommendations, such as foster care or a residential setting for child victims. “I help determine what caused [the injury], what help the child can get, and whether the child is safe in his or her home,” Lambert says. The good news is that of the 30 to 60 cases called into the hotline each day, serious abuse, such as fractures and burns, is “thankfully rare.” And different cultural and religious norms in ethnically diverse South Florida can lead to misunderstandings. “There are some things that are considered abusive that are probably not. We need to be at least conscious that some things are okay and others are not okay,” says Lambert. “There are a lot of parents who, with appropriate counseling, can be helped.”
At first, Lambert might not seem like the ideal candidate for this kind of job. With his long grey ponytail and beard, Lambert looks more like a musician than a physician. But he’s “not a hippie,” he’s quick to point out, and his Ivy League school background (Brown University) and medical degrees bear that out.
Before going to medical school at UM, Lambert worked as a social worker, which helped determine the specialty he would eventually choose. The son of a pediatrician, the socially active Lambert thought pediatrics would be a good springboard to a job in national service.
For anyone who has and/or loves children, this would seem like an especially depressing job. But Lambert loves what he does. “There are a lot of positives. The people who survive in this job are spiritually based and/or know how to laugh. But you never know which case is going to bother you. I’ve had tough cases that haven’t fazed me and others that I just can’t talk about. Every day is different in my life.”
While they are only beginning to look at exploiting CD44 as a way to treat these cancers, the value as a diagnostic tool is clear. Eight out of ten oral, pharyngeal, and laryngeal cancers occur in people who consume tobacco or alcohol, but not everybody who smokes and/or drinks gets these head and neck cancers. A simple saliva test could help screen people in an at-risk population and help catch the cancers early, which can double the cure rate to more than 80 percent.