Trauma Informed Care; What is it? Why is it important

Trauma-informed care is an approach thatincorporates an individual’s entire life experience, background, andself-perception when treating trauma. 

It is rooted in thegroundwork that trauma plays a significant role in the existence of society andthat many people have it and respond to it in different ways.

However, instead ofviewing this trauma from the perspective of “what’s wrong with you,”trauma-informed care centers the conversation around “what happened to you.”

Trauma-informed care strives to:

• Highlight the ubiquitous impact of trauma and recognize different paths to recovery.
• Acknowledge the way trauma manifests and how it affects patients, family, and staff.
• Avoid retraumatization during every step of the treatment and healing process.
• Pursue and incorporate newknowledge about trauma into policies, procedures, and practices. 

Why Is Trauma-Informed Care Training Important?

According to the Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry (JAAP), roughly 51% of people in the general population in the United States have been exposed totrauma. 

With over 166 million people carrying some form of trauma,many go untreated or are entirely unaware that their trauma is affecting otherparts of their lives and behavior. 

Trauma-informed care helps shift our societal perspectiveabout how trauma demonstrates itself from person to person. It also helpstrauma-affected individuals shift their response to it so they break out ofunhealthy patterns caused by trauma. 

Trauma-informed care training (TICT) allows human and psilocybin facilitators to understand an individual’s frame of mind and life experience during interactions and treatment, leading to better engagement, care, and outcomes. 

Trauma-informed care establishes that the recovery and healing from trauma should be embraced by a holistic perspective. This means that as trauma-informed care providers, we must recognize how trauma can affect a person’s mental, physical, and emotional health as a whole. 

Psilocybin-assisted experiences grounded in a trauma-informed care approach allows facilitators to address the unique, multi-faceted needs of each client. By weaving together the biological, psychological, social, and behavioral threads, psychedelic therapists and facilitators can promote comprehensive and effective healing. 

Trauma-informed care training is vital to psilocybin-assisted experiences, not only as a practice but as a philosophy. By recognizing the deep interconnectedness of our experiences, the profound societal impact of trauma, and the incredible efficacy of psychedelics in mental health and behavioral health treatments, we can continue to improve trauma care therapy.

As the field of psilocybin-assisted experiences in a legal framework continues to evolve,trauma-informed care will stand as a guiding light toward more compassionate, empathetic, and efficacious trauma-based therapy. 

Studies have already suggested that trauma-informed care may be an anchor for safe and reliable psilocybintherapy and facilitated consumption. 

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