This lecture will introduce participants to the medical and legal controversies surrounding the so-called Shaken Baby Syndrome, including its re-branding under the new name "Abusive Head Trauma." Topics will include the history of the diagnosis (including how the diagnosis became widely accepted in the medical community with no real investigation into its forensic reliability), the challenges to the diagnosis that have severely undercut its forensic reliability, the responses to the challenges by the child abuse community, and the state of the controversy today. Participants will be given recommendations about experts in various fields to use to effectively defend cases involving SBS/AHT.
