Vincent Felitti first made the connection between childhood abuse and adult health during an obesity research study he ran in the 1980s. During a routine checkup with one of his patients, she mentioned that the year after she was raped, she gained 105 pounds. Felitti recalled what happened next: “She looked down at the carpet and muttered to herself, ‘Overweight is overlooked. And, that’s the way I needed to be.’”

Felitti started asking all of his patients about sexual abuse. The results were shocking. “It seemed every other patient in the program was acknowledging a history of childhood sexual abuse,” he said. In the end, 55 percent of his patients disclosed that they had been abused.

That study kicked off Felitti’s life work. Felitti partnered with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to survey more than 17,000 patients. He found that patients who experienced childhood trauma were more likely to be sick when they grew up. But, it took over 20 years for Vincent Felitti’s research to gain mainstream acceptance.