Vicarious trauma
Those who respond to a disaster incident are also more likely to be traumatised themselves. Vicarious trauma or secondary post traumatic stress is the term for this.
Its characteristics include:
- Intrusive thoughts, smells, sounds, images or memories.
- Feeling as though the event is happening again.
- Nightmares.
- Being unable to stop thinking about what happened.
- Anxiety or anger leading to avoidance of certain work related situations.
Burnout
Staff who repeatedly respond to disaster situations may be at increased risk of work related exhaustion also known as burnout.
This refers to a state of mind associated with feelings of hopelessness, frustration, anger and depression and beliefs that you can’t do your job effectively. These negative feelings usually have a gradual onset and accumulate over time.
Compassion fatigue
Staff are also open to a similar risk of profound weariness or what is otherwise termed as compassion fatigue.
This can lead to a sense of numbness at work or not caring. Someone experiencing this will have a reduced capacity to do the tasks required of them or to work in a way that reflects their underlying values.
These are the warning signs that you or your colleagues are being unduly affected by these:
- Less work-life balance.
- Social withdrawal or isolation or loneliness.
- Work-related nightmares.
- Negative view of the world or people.
- Increased illness or fatigue.
- Increased sense of danger.
- Difficulties making decisions.
- Reduced productivity.
- Avoiding things at work.
- Having less patience or being abrupt.
Video
Watch the YouTube video below which describes what compassion fatigue is.
Video
Watch this TEDx video about empathy and vicarious trauma.
(TED.com (opens in a new tab), CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 (opens in a new tab))
Some things to think about
- If you work as a responder, volunteer or maybe are close to someone who is, what has helped you cope in the past and are those factors still around?
- If the previous section about when to seek further help applies to you then consider doing so.