Law enforcement and first responder organizations have identified the importance of Trauma Informed operations for many years. There are countless popular media columns, articles, and editorials that anecdotally recognize this contemporary issue. For those of us working in the industry the truth of negative psychosocial outcomes resulting from a combination of organizational stress and trauma exposure is an incontrovertible experiential fact. Many of us have either personally lived experiences or at least witnessed the substance use, depression, hypervigilance, anger, pessimism, relationship and familial distress, or self-harm behavior and psychosocial outcomes associated with working in this commonly toxic environment. While large bureaucratic organizations are not exclusive members of this club their cultural norms, practices, and identity are much more significantly resistant to a belief in change let alone change itself than are smaller units/teams.
Large and small first responder agencies have implemented response systems meant to recognize signs or symptoms in an individual as well as identifying incidents or events likely to induce a trauma reaction. These agencies have additionally identified proper response to increase employee coping skills when trauma exposure is anticipated. For example, the Michigan Department of Corrections established the department's Wellness Unit in 2019 and has had a Traumatic Incident Stress Management (TISM) response and debriefing process for my entire 30-year career. The Wellness Unit and the TISM response (MDOC has now transitioned to identifying a TISM response incident as a CISM response to match community terminology) are vitally important to overall employee wellbeing and making them feel valued. The industry understanding of trauma exposure impact shapes the afore mentioned policy and practice. The unfortunate truth is that these policy and procedural practices fall short of being considered best-practices.
Peer-reviewed, evidence-based research has identified the importance of proactive agency practices targeted to reduce the negative impact of trauma exposure through intentional effort toward identifying and increasing protective factors for agency personnel. The best example and largest scale implementation of this proactive approach to active skill building is found in the United States Army's Master Resilience School (USAMRS). The Army teaches their personnel methods of increasing resilience, enhancing performance, and reducing the negative impact of trauma exposure. Please find a training proposal on this site submitted as an impetus for change meant to introduce a large-scale cultural transition for another difficult culture to empower. I believe any agency, large or small, can benefit from programming designed to build protective factors, therefore designed to build resilience, reduce trauma impact and reduce the incidence of employee burnout, Corrections Fatigue.
The Problem: Stress Related Outcomes
“Correctional agencies are losing money, losing good employees and jeopardizing officer and public safety due to work related stress.” (Helping Probation and Parole Officers Cope with Stress, 2007) Working conditions stress and trauma exposure are a national corrections industry and first responder epidemic. The exposure to acute and chronic stressors in the corrections industry could be the greatest threat corrections employees’ face (Carlson & Thomas, 2006). The life expectancy for an average citizen in the United States is between 76 and 78 years of age. The life expectancy for Corrections Officers is between 55 and 59 years of age. The suicide rate is 39% higher for Corrections Officers than for the public. A National Comorbidity Study established: 61% of men and 51% of women in the general population experience one traumatic event in their lifetime. A Desert Waters Correctional Outreach study revealed that corrections industry professionals experience as many as forty traumatic events during their career (Finn, 1998). Corrections employees have a higher rate of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) than firefighters, deployed military and other first responders. A 2013 study of corrections officers by the National Institute of Justice found that 31% of corrections professionals suffered from PTSD and 17% suffered from PTSD combined with Depression (Finn, 1998). Even if a person doesn’t meet the full symptomatic, diagnostic requirements of a PTSD diagnosis, functioning in constant proximity to acute, chronic, and traumatic stressors can result in negative mental, emotional, behavioral, and physiological stress-based effects. The prudent, responsible and humane thing to do is to implement a proactive systemic Trauma-Informed Leadership behavior action plan.
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