Integrative Touch for Kids

Integrative Touch for Kids (ITK) changes the way people experience health and healing through a “Whole Child, Whole Family, Whole Community” wellness model and has been a leader in pediatric integrative medicine for over 16 years. We bring integrative therapies to children with special medical needs, their families, and healthcare workers. Given the changes due to the COVID-19 pandemic, more medically fragile children and healthcare workers than ever before need our services. We have quickly taken measures to provide virtual resources to our families through a web-based portal we developed to respond to this imminent need. We are delivering our content in innovative ways. ITK is poised to replicate our already far-reaching results. In our TeleHealth program, we are showing significant reductions in pain and anxiety and improvements in resilience and global well being. In 5 years, we would like to see the ITK model spread far and wide to change the future of pediatric integrative medicine internationally. The funding from the Elevate Prize would allow us to reach that goal.

Nearly one in five children in the US has a special medical need, and this is the first generation that is predicted to have a shorter lifespan than their parents. Additionally, healthcare workers are experiencing the highest rates of burnout ever. That’s where ITK steps in. ITK is taking an innovative 'whole systems' approach to this problem that addresses caring for healthcare providers, children with special medical needs, their parents, siblings & primary caregivers. Our Telehealth platform is allowing us to offer research backed wellness education, emotional support and skill based learning to build resilience and decrease burnout, stress, pain & anxiety. Integrative Touch for Kids envisions a world where social barriers are broken down and whole communities are engaged in supporting families struggling with special medical needs, improving the quality of life for all. ITK’s purpose is to enhance well-being, minimize suffering and facilitate healing for families with children with developmental disabilities, genetic conditions, cancers, and other chronic, acute, life limiting illnesses and the greater community. Our goal for the future is to bring the profound healing of integrative medicine to children by expanding our partnerships with children’s hospitals and other organizations that provide pediatric IM services internatonally. 

We are spending 17% of our GDP on healthcare (150% increase from 1970), but providers are more stressed than ever before. U.S. suicide rates among physicians are double that of the general population. Nurses exhibit burnout rates as high as 35%. These highly taxed individuals are caring for the most vulnerable among us. Alarmingly, 1 in 5 children has some type of special health or medical need and moms of children with autism show chronic levels of stress hormones as high as soldiers in combat. Americans spend <$33 billion annually on out of pocket complementary & alternative medicine costs. In the U.S. alone, there are more than 230 children's hospitals who can be positively impacted by the TeleHealth Program. Additionally, the CDC and the HRSA found that 17% of children aged 3–17 years had a developmental disability in the U.S., a significant increase from the two prior time periods studied. The inflammation caused by this toxic, adverse stress can set a person up for lifelong health problems such as:  heart disease, autoimmune disease, depression, anxiety or PTSD, if it is not addressed.

ITK is taking an innovative 'whole systems' approach to this problem that addresses caring for healthcare providers, children with special medical needs, their parents, siblings and primary caregivers. Our Telehealth platform is allowing us to offer research backed wellness education, emotional support and skills based learning to build resilience and decrease burnout, stress, pain & anxiety. This innovative model aims to transform pediatric medical care—paving the way to optimal health, healing, and emotional well-being. Additionally, ITK is the only organization to offer therapies not only to children with special medical needs, but also their families, caregivers, and healthcare providers. ITK’s work serves as a catalyst to accelerate the integration of conventional and complementary approaches to health care. Our goal is to enable a practice change in community based pediatric healthcare. The current healthcare system uses a prescriptive treatment model, whereas Integrative Touch for Kids uses a receptive listening model that places the child and their entire family at the center of their care.

ITK’s programs create impact in family systems and are rooted in whoe communities that empower children with significant medical needs. Programs are driven by measurable results. We partner with researchers at the University of Arizona to evaluate pre and post-session surveys that measure the impacts our programs are having. We have seen a significant reduction in pain, anxiety, and burnout, and increases in wellbeing and resilience in our TeleHealth programs. We are poised to continue replicating these results and have taken steps to initiate and deepen our relationships with pediatric healthcare providers around the country to do so. We recognize that by partnering with healthcare organizations who can underwrite program costs to achieve these outstanding results for their employees, patients and families, we can greatly increase the numbers served. At ITK, we believe that our therapeutic services should be available to all, regardless of socioeconomic status, and we strive to provide access to these services that may not otherwise be attainable. Through our programs’ impact we are helping to create a world where social barriers are broken down and whole communities are engaged in supporting families struggling with special medical needs, improving the quality of life for all.