Trauma-informed Care in the Telehealth Era

Abstract

Purpose. The purpose of this quality improvement project was to implement and evaluate the usefulness of a trauma-informed care training video designed for telehealth professionals providing mental health services. Background. Trauma-informed care is a framework for practice that health professionals can use to understand the multidimensional challenges their patients may have experienced, as well as providing tools to empower, build trust, and avoid re-traumatization. While telehealth services are quickly expanding to reach underserved communities, it is unclear whether skills training in areas such as trauma-informed care is translatable to the digital mode of care delivery. Methods. Participants were healthcare professionals recruited from a telehealth-focused company that was providing counseling and medication management. The primary investigator created a 15-minute trauma-informed care training video intervention distributed via email. Qualtrics software was used to distribute a post-intervention survey. Results. Ten participants received the invitation to participate via email. The project was open to participants for a total of three weeks. Two of the participants reviewed the disclosure statement. None of the participants completed the post-intervention survey. It is unknown whether the participants viewed the training video. Results were discussed through the lens of the Health Belief Model framework. Conclusions. This project enabled the student to learn the quality improvement process. This project helped illuminate possible directions for future research such as exploring what training telehealth professionals may desire, and how remote workers assimilate and connect with their organization’s mission and values.