Trauma-informed care at Welbeck

What is trauma-informed care?

Trauma can be physical or mental, and can be related to violence or any traumatic event that impacts mental health and wellbeing, affecting the way in which a patient experiences health care. 

Trauma-informed care is a whole-system approach that’s grounded in understanding how to ensure the physical and psychological safety of trauma-affected patients. Clinical settings can inadvertently trigger trauma responses, such as loss of control, pain or exposure. Understanding how to reduce triggers is critical for ensuring the patient experience is optimised, and patients feel safe and supported at every stage of care.

The 6 principles of trauma-informed care 

Our trauma-informed approach is built on 6 core principles, which build the foundation to transform a health care setting:

1. Safety – we prioritise the physical, psychological, and emotional safety of our patients, their family, and our staff.

2. Trustworthiness – our policies and procedures promote transparency, with the objective of building trust.

3. Choice – we listen to our patients and support them in shared decision-making, helping them to feel safe and in control at every stage.

4. Collaboration – we work with patients to understand their needs and how we can improve our services, processes, and procedures. 

5. Empowerment – we recognise that patients who have experienced trauma may feel powerless to control what happens to them, so we ensure they have a strong voice in decision-making.

6. Cultural consideration – we strive to move past cultural stereotypes and biases by incorporating policies, protocols, and processes into our service that are responsive to the needs of all individuals.

Improving our approach to and delivery of trauma-informed care

By following a trauma-informed approach to care, we’re striving to recognise that trauma can affect individuals, groups, and communities and understand the signs and symptoms and widespread impact of trauma. We’re working hard to integrate knowledge about trauma into our policies, procedures, and practices and actively avoid and prevent re-traumatisation.

Here are some of the ways we’re doing this:

Patient-led forum

We invited a patient who has experienced trauma to talk to Welbeck clinical staff about their previous healthcare experiences. This first-hand account helped raise awareness and understanding of trauma-informed care, as well as helping us to develop our trauma-informed care protocols. 

Process modifications

We’ve updated our pre-assessment process to make it easier for patients to inform us if they have any additional needs. If a need for trauma-informed care has been identified, our team follows a specific protocol to ensure the appropriate support and care is delivered.

Policy development

We’re currently developing our in-house policy and standard operating procedure to support the trauma-informed care process, which will be rolled out across our centres. We’re committed to collaborating with our patients long-term, to continually critique and improve our approach. 

Staff training and empowerment

By providing training to our staff, we’re starting to positively change the culture at Welbeck, and embed empathetic care into our standard practice. We’re enabling staff to ask the patients the right questions, to ensure that any additional needs are met with a sympathetic and caring approach, where the patient remains in control throughout their care. 

How to ask for trauma-informed care at Welbeck

We’ve built opportunities into our booking and pre-assessment processes to enable patients to highlight any additional needs they may have. When asked if there’s any additional support you may require throughout your patient journey, you can ask specifically for trauma-informed care, or say you need some additional support. This will be discussed and will form the basis for your experience.