Trauma risk management (TRiM) is an essential peer support system designed for people who have experienced potentially traumatic events (PTEs). It originated in the UK Armed Forces but is now implemented in many high-risk organisations, including emergency service organisations, security firms, charities and government agencies. Any high-risk working environment will benefit from TRiM.
The success of the TRiM model relies on the vital work of practitioners and managers like Teresa Lines, a trauma risk incident manager for a security humanitarian team at the FCDO. Professionals such as Terri Lines are trained to spot signs of trauma in staff that others might miss, allowing them to provide specialised support and break the stigma of mental health in organisations where trauma is recurrent.
Unfortunately, trauma is regularly underdiagnosed. According to Psychology Today, approximately 90% of post-traumatic stress disorder diagnoses are missed by clinicians. This is often due to people, particularly staff who work for high-stress organisations, feeling unable to process their feelings of trauma or seek help from medical professionals.
There is also some general uncertainty as to what constitutes a PTE. Frightening events are only considered potentially traumatic, so staff are liable to react to them in different ways, and there is no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ reaction.
Therefore, it is an organisation’s duty to understand what a PTE may look like. Some examples include:
- Experiencing or witnessing abusive behaviour
- Actual or threatened injury or violence
- Receiving shocking information on the job
- Direct or indirect exposure to traumatic details of events while undertaking professional duties
In these circumstances, it is the organisation’s moral and legal obligation to implement TRiM to ensure staff receive a trauma risk assessment and occupational support following a major incident. For more information about the TRiM process, please see the embedded PDF.
Yet, despite worrying statistics published by the Mental Health Foundation, many organisations still underestimate the emotional and psychological impacts of trauma on staff. Many symptoms of PTSD are internalised and some clinicians neglect to ask patients about their trauma in enough detail to make a diagnosis.
That’s why organisations need TRiM. Without it, staff working in dangerous environments will continue to suffer following PTEs. TRiM enhances the interactions between line managers and mental health workers, allowing organisations to increase peer support through a sustainable model that can be implemented in any high-risk organisation.
