Behavioral Health Mitigation Strategies

The following are mitigation strategies for implementation within various settings to prevent or reduce the cause, impact, and consequences of a disaster:

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Public Health/Policy/Leadership

Strategies to begin conversations in communities and identify areas where disaster preparedness efforts can be strengthened. Learn more at the American Academy of Pediatrics site: Building an Effective System of Care to Address Emerging Threats to Infants and Children (AAP) 

Trauma-Informed Care

(ED, medical home, and other ambulatory settings): Organizations should adopt the approach that patients might have had adverse childhood experiences, may currently be experiencing trauma, and possibly had exposure to natural, biologic, and/or manmade disasters. The key principles to establishing a trauma-informed system of care include: Realizing the widespread impact of trauma and understanding potential pathways to recovery; Recognizing signs and symptoms of trauma in patients; Responding by fully integrating knowledge about trauma into policies, procedures and practices; and Resist re-traumatization. SAMHSA’S Concept of Trauma and Guidance for a Trauma-Informed Approach  and The National Child Traumatic Stress Network Trauma-Informed Integrated Care for Children and Families in Healthcare Settings are excellent resources related to the topic,

To obtain additional information for behavioral health clinicians: The Role of the Behavioral Health Clinician in Supporting a Trauma-Informed System of Care by Kimberly Burkhart, PhD: (specific article – maybe a link?; scholarly references would be included here)

Working with Families

These include resources for helping families with making a plan, preparing a disaster supplies kit, and becoming familiar with a family readiness toolkit. These resources reinforce that all families need to be prepared for natural, biologic, and manmade disasters. Medical or behavioral health professionals can assist families with developing an emergency plan that involves identification of how the family will communicate and addresses specific needs of the household including where to shelter, safe meeting places, special medical needs, and contact information.

The World Health Organization recently recognized that physician-centered individual care and hospital-based programs were inadequate to achieve global health. A population-based approach allows for multiple levels of intervention to address the health and mental health needs of the total population. Behavioral health clinicians can mobilize the workforce to prepare for the psychological needs of children exposed to disasters through psychoeducation on risk and resilience factors, trauma reactions in children, collective trauma, and vicarious/secondary trauma.