Trauma Focused Interventions in
Action
Shalonda Brooks, PhD
Staff Psychologist
DePelchin Children’s Center
Services
• DePelchin Children’s Center is an outpatient community
center that offers several services
– Counseling : individual, family, and group
– Psychiatry
– Assessment
– Residential Treatment Center
– Foster care and Adoption
Trauma informed interventions
• Strengthening Family Coping Resources
• Parent Child Interaction Therapy
• Attachment, self-Regulation, and Competency
Framework
• Psychological First Aid
Trauma informed interventions
• Strengthening Family Coping Resources
– 15-week long multifamily group for families that have
been affected by trauma
– One of the main goals is to help families remember
and build upon their past and current resources so
they are better able to cope with their current
difficulties.
Strengthening Family Coping Resources
• This skill-based intervention is modular in approach with
each skill building upon the previous skill. Skills include
enhancing sense of safety, increasing stability by
building up rituals and routines, and improving
communication and emotion regulation.
Strengthening Family Coping Resources
Strengthening Family Coping Resources
Strengthening Family Coping Resources
• What makes it unique?
– Focuses on how trauma affects the family as whole
– It is interactive
– Works at the child’s developmental level
Strengthening Family Coping Resources
• How we have used it here
– 4 successful groups
– To provide wrap around services and continuation of
care
– To provide new services
Parent Child Interaction Therapy
• Originally a behavior management program for children
ages 2-7 with disruptive behavior problems.
• Identified as a treatment for families with a history of
physical abuse.
• Skills taught help interrupt coercive parenting cycles.
• Parents learn new behavior management techniques
that do not involve physical punishment.
Parent Child Interaction Therapy
• Why is this appropriate for families with trauma?
– trauma interrupts daily functioning and normal
development and interactions.
– members may have difficulties experiencing positive
feelings and may have strained relationships
– traumatized children often display some disruptive
behaviors.
Parent Child Interaction Therapy
• It is effective in helping build back up positive
relationships between parents and children, by using
play, praise, and attention.
• Helps parents manage disruptive behaviors.
• Parents (and clinician) model and reinforce appropriate
ways to deal with emotions such as frustration and
anger.
Parent Child Interaction Therapy
• How we have used it here
– Staff trainings
– In house trainers
– PCIT clinic
Attachment, self-Regulation, and Competency
• It is a flexible framework for treating complex trauma in
youth.
• Complex trauma - “repeated and prolonged exposure to
adverse experiences that occur within the context of the
primary attachment/caregiver system and that have an
adverse impact on the developmental functioning in
multiple domains.
Attachment, self-Regulation, and Competency
• Goals are to help children feel safe and connected
(Attachment), recognize and express feelings and their
feelings appropriately as well as learning to understand
the feelings of others (Self-Regulation), and learn coping
strategies to help them deal with the surroundings and
gain a better understanding of who they are and their
goals (Competency).
• 10 building blocks that address issues.
Attachment, self-Regulation, and Competency
• ARC allows the clinician to look at a child from a trauma
informed lens.
• The framework takes into account how trauma may have
affected normal development and is resulting in the
current issues/behaviors that are being exhibited by the
child.
• Clinicians can then address their issues at the child’s
developmental level.
Attachment, self-Regulation, and Competency
• How we have used it here
– Conducting trainings for clinicians in counseling and
for the Residential Treatment Center.
– ARC within the foster care and adoption programs at
DePelchin.
– Our plans are to roll out ARC trainings organization
wide by early 2013.
Psychological First Aid
• Purpose is to assist families after a disaster or act of
terrorism.
• It is meant to be a brief short-term intervention.
• Can be delivered by any person trained in PFA in a
variety of settings.
Psychological First Aid
• Principles of PFA are built upon empirical research but
are very applicable in field setting.
• Techniques are meant to be developmentally appropriate
and culturally sensitive.
Psychological First Aid
• Has 8 core actions
– Contact and engagement
– Safety and comfort
– Stabilization
– Information gathering
– Practical assistance
– Connection with social supports
– Information on coping
– Linkage with collaborative services
Psychological First Aid
• What makes PFA unique?
– Brief and short term
– Flexible and fluid
– Can be delivered by almost anyone
– Provides immediate assistance plus supports long
term care.
Psychological First Aid
• How we have used it here
– Community Trainings
– Trained clinicians
For more information
• Visit us at depelchin.org
• Call us at 713-730-2335
• Contact information: Shalonda Brooks, 713-558-3936,
sbrooks@depelchin.org