Posted on: 17 July 2023
The Mental Health Unit at Northwick Park Hospital in Harrow welcomed five police officers from the Police Mental Health Liaison Service on Wednesday 15 February 2023.
The team gave the five officers an introductory training session on Trauma Informed Approaches (TIA). The training aims to raise awareness that experiences of adversity and trauma can lead to mental health difficulties, and teaches strategies that may help police officers to better manage distress in themselves and others.
It was delivered by Clinical Psychologist, Dr Gina Harwood and Crisis Services Manager, Fungayi Useya.
The police officers were invited to give feedback and they considered the training to be ‘excellent’ and ‘very good.’
The police officers ‘strongly agreed’ or ‘agreed’ that the training helped them to better understand the development of mental health difficulties, developed their knowledge and skills, increased their compassion, increased their confidence in speaking about trauma and adversity, and taught them supportive strategies that may help them to de-escalate incidents.
The police officers thought their colleagues would also benefit from the training, and the Harrow TIA team are hoping to offer more training opportunities to local police officers in the future.