Over the last decade or so, as the impact of trauma and adversity on children has been recognised, Trauma Informed Care has been increasingly promoted and implemented in children’s social care services. It is understood that the more adverse events a child experiences in his or her life the greater the chances are that they will suffer health problems, mental health concerns, or experience a substance use disorder in later life.
Trauma Informed Care is recognised as providing one of the most applicable responses to the adversity and trauma that young people have experienced.
The use of Viewpoint self-assessment tools supports the Guiding Principles of Trauma InformedCare. [ Read more: https://bit.ly/3awOsi2)]
The approach can encourage trauma informed practice and add to staff knowledge and understanding. As well as the many trauma-focused therapies, there are many other approaches that, if not specifically trauma-focused, have the potential to overlap with these by exploring children’s previous experiences (e.g. life story work), and support recovery both within the family and the care environment.
Some organisations use trauma assessments delivered through Viewpoint, such as Child Report of Post-traumatic Symptoms. This is a self-report measure for children and adolescents that assesses a broad range of post-traumatic symptoms, with or without an identified trauma, and can be used to measure changes in symptomatology over time.