New AHA resource offers workforce trauma support strategies

A new issue brief from AHA’s Hospitals Against Violence initiative offers proven strategies and action steps to help hospitals and health systems provide trauma support to their workforce after an incident or threat of violence. The second in a series based on HAV’s framework for building a safe workplace and community, the issue brief was developed with input from the Medical University of South Carolina’s National Mass Violence Victimization Resource Center.
 
“It is possible for health care workers who have experienced trauma caused by witnessing, experiencing and responding to violence to learn to cope and heal when they have the right types of support in place to help them,” the brief notes. “Health care organizations play a critical role in ensuring health care workers experiencing the effects of trauma receive the resources, care and tools they need to start and stay on a path to recovery.”