Trauma-informed Care

Some people may appear outwardly affected, while in others, the signs may not be immediately obvious –  but over time, they can become evident. A Trauma-informed Care approach promotes well-being by ensuring that the policies, procedures and environments in a workplace, school or healthcare setting, for example, are mindful of people’s trauma histories and support the physical, psychological and emotional safety of its workforce. Trauma-informed Care understands and considers the pervasive nature of trauma and promotes environments of healing and recovery rather than practices and services that may inadvertently re-traumatise.

There are six principles of Trauma-informed Care:

• Trauma awareness: It’s essential to be aware of and knowledgeable about the impacts of traumatic experiences on individuals, families, and communities. Creating a trauma-informed workplace means integrating an understanding of trauma and how it can affect people into all aspects of your organisational structure and team. It is particularly important to be aware of the high likelihood of particular types of trauma exposure specific to your organisation and the impacts on your team or client base. 
• Promotion of safety: throughout your organisation, both your team and the clients they’re working with need to feel physically and emotionally safe. The goal is to provide your team with a sense of security through organisational policy and practice. 
• Rebuilding control: in a trauma-informed organisation, it’s key that both team members and clients are provided clear and appropriate messages about their rights and have a say in trauma-informed policy and practice.
• Focusing on strengths: Taking a strengths-based approach means aiming to understand how a person’s behaviour after a trauma event makes sense, given their personal experience of distress and limited access to resources. It involves exploring and challenging your assumptions about why people behave the way they do when they’re struggling with the impacts of trauma. Having a trauma-informed view of all behaviour, including challenging behaviour, shows the understanding that said behaviour represents a trauma-impacted individual’s best efforts to cope.
• Promoting connection: Promoting connection helps to establish contacts with primary support people and organisations, as well as other sources of support, including family members, friends, and community helping resources. This helps to foster recovery from traumatic events by ensuring that people are given the specific help that they need at every step along their journey.
• Belief in recovery: The focus of trauma-informed care is to instil a sense of hope and support and foster belief in recovery, acknowledging that responses to trauma range in complexity. To support recovery, an organisation must respond appropriately to all different kinds of trauma and the impacts of that trauma, including recent and past traumatic events. Supporting recovery from trauma must also take a preventative approach through managing the risk of future exposure to trauma for team members and clients. 

Interested in developing your Trauma-informed Care skills? Phoenix Australia’s Trauma-informed Care course was developed by clinical experts in mental health and informed by research, practice knowledge, and input from trauma survivors. It teaches the principles of Trauma-informed Care and how they can be applied to support wellbeing in your workplace. It also helps you to build the skills necessary to develop and implement policies and procedures and create a safe environment that supports those affected by trauma and ensures the overall wellbeing of your workforce and organisation.

The course is designed for people with no or minimal mental health skills training and does not require a previous qualification.