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Critical Incident Debriefing

What is Critical Incident Debriefing (CID)?

Critical Incident Debriefing (CID) is a carefully phased intervention implemented immediately following a major incident such as war zone trauma, civilian disaster, terrorist incident or natural disaster.  The aim of immediate implementation of CID after such an event is to specifically prevent, limit or alleviate the onset of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) following exposure to such an incident.

CID was originally developed for the benefit of emergency services and military personnel who regularly experience as much exposure to traumatic stress in periods as short as a month than the majority of the population might experience in their whole life.

However, CID is not limited to use by HM Forces or the Emergency Services, just as PTSD is not suffered exclusively by them.  Anyone can be a victim of violent crime and without specialist help could experience PTSD at a later date, and so the process has been refined and developed with experience and is now available to benefit the general population as well.

The de-briefing process offers a two-fold approach. Initially. as short-term intervention in the early stages post incident it often aids in preventing some of the long term or cumulative affects associated with traumatic incidents.  Over the longer term the de-briefing process allows people to gain insight and view an incident from a different, more beneficial viewpoint.

De-briefing is available for both individuals and groups who have been exposed to trauma.

What is a Critical Incident?

• An industrial accident resulting in injury or death
• A national or international disaster
• Sudden death
• Murder
• Suicide
• Terrorism
• Fire
• Assault or Rape

Certain sections of the general public are obviously more likely to suffer a Critical Incident.  For example, staff in all night filling stations, off licences, sub post offices, and late night convenience stores where employees in these locations could be threatened, or even attacked, by persons armed with guns, knives or other offensive weapons.  The victim absolutely believes that his or her life is in danger at the time of the attack, and is therefore traumatised. 

Another example would be the increasingly common incidents where suicides have involved members of the public to facilitate their deaths, such as train drivers or truck drivers, where the trauma arises both from witnessing the death of the suicide, and unwittingly being the instrument of the death.

Psychological Debriefing or Critical Incident Debriefing (the terms are used interchangeably) is ideally carried out two to three days after an incident, and preferably within one month.  Anecdotal evidence suggests however that a debrief such as this can be beneficial even many years after an event.  Indeed, I have been witness to this myself, when an ex-member of the Foreign Legion successfully dealt with an incident which had occurred some fifteen years previously, and more recently, when helping a member of HM Navy successfully recover from an incident which occurred during the Falklands War in 1982.

The most common model employed by Debriefers is the Mitchell and Dyregrove model. This consists of a seven-stage process which people are guided through by the debriefer/s.  The intention is to allow people the opportunity to talk, express their feelings, discuss any concerns arising from the incident and most essentially to prevent them from ‘bottling up' their feelings and emotions.  It is when this happens that psychological distress becomes a concern. 

The debriefing process is described by Dyregrove as: "a group meeting to review the impressions and reactions that survivors, bereaved or helpers experience during or following critical incidents, accidents or disasters. The meeting aims at reducing unnecessary psychological after-effects."  Although Dyregov refers to a group meeting, debriefing can also be successfully used on individuals.  In short, Debriefings accelerate the recovery of normal people experiencing normal reactions, to abnormal events.

Personally, I prefer to take the debriefing process even further by employing EMDR.

The aim of CID

The aim of CID is to minimise unnecessary psychological distress or responses in the aftermath of a traumatic event by allowing the ventilation of impressions, feelings, and reactions, and to help people to make sense of their experience by creating a better understanding of the nature of traumatic incidents, explaining the normalcy and predictability of reactions, allowing feelings to be shared, and reversing a natural tendency to 'bottle thing up'.

             

 

FREE TREATMENT FOR ARMED-SERVICES PERSONNEL SUFFERING WITH PTSD

There is little enough those of us in the civilian population can do to help the men and women who protect our country and keep the peace abroad.  To show my gratitude to these brave, selfless people, I am delighted to be able to offer FREE treatment for serving and ex-Armed Forces personnel suffering with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.  

I am a specially trained and registered practitioner of Critical Incident Debriefing, and this, together with other techniques I am able to employ, can help to minimise and even heal the dreadful effects of PTSD.  All I request is a written report from the medic under whose care you fall, confirming that you are suffering from PTSD.

If you want to check out the Register of Trauma Specialists to which I belong, click on the logo below and it will take you to the RTS website. 

Please contact me to discover how I can help you.