Tips
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1. Keep
your employees informed of your plans should a major earthquake occur.
2. Have a plan in case your building is damaged.
3. Establish specific protocols to follow immediately after the
earthquake. Will employees be allowed to go home to check on family members and
their homes?
4. Have adequate food, water, flashlights, radios, fire extinguishers, first aid, and other necessary supplies on hand in case employees get
stranded due to road closures and fires.
5. Ensure your communication system can operate without electricity for at least 72 hours.
6. Educate your managers and employees on the symptoms of trauma - what are normal reactions by normal people to an abnormal situation.
7. Arrange for post-event debriefings and decompression for all members of the workforce.
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Dear ,
Perhaps one of the scariest traumas to protect your company
against is a natural disaster. Living in the Bay Area, earthquakes are
a part of our history and our present reality. Warnings of the next big
earthquake are seen and heard everywhere. As we work toward physically
preparing ourselves and our cities to withstand earthquakes, it is
important to also mentally and emotionally prepare our companies and
their people. As the 20-year anniversary of Loma Prieta approaches, we
thought it fitting to discuss earthquake preparedness for your company
in this month's newsletter.
We hope you find the information
in this newsletter useful. If you have questions that have not been
answered, please feel free to peruse the related resources we have
shared or contact us by email at info@traumaoutreach.com
Best regards,
Vanessa & Wilma
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Earthquake Readiness - 20 years after Loma Prieta
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 If you were in the Bay Area 20 years ago, you cannot help but remember when the
earth shook for 15 seconds. Though the Loma Prieta earthquake ended as quickly as it began, its reverberations are seen and felt decades later. Long after the dust has settled,
the memory of the event lingers in the minds of those who witnessed its impact and aftermath.
"I recall working in a brick building that was deemed
'unsafe' following the earthquake. After a few days of inspections, we were
informed that it was safe to return to the building. Our chief executive
refused to go back. She was so shaken and rattled by her experience in the
building that she could not re-enter. Another seven days elapsed before normal
business operations could resume." -Trauma Talk Reader
The economic cost to businesses following a devastating
natural disaster can be measured by more than the physical damage incurred, but also, more importantly, in terms of the psychological impact such an
event has on individuals.
What are the elements that allow first responders - fire
fighters, police officers, emergency medical technicians - to sustain their
response efforts even though they have endured the same disaster? Why don't
first responders ever say, "We're too traumatized to do our jobs?" One word: preparation. The more drilled and prepared we are to know how to handle natural disasters or any other critical incident for that matter, the better our resilience and recovery capabilities
are.
In the face of fear for their own lives and worry about the lives of their loved ones, first responders still maintain the capacity to perform search and rescue operations with precision and determination.
How is this possible and how can we begin to transfer those skills to the
business sector? The first step is to acknowledge that when overwhelming events happen
that are out of our control, we will be psychologically impacted.
In addition, it is essential to recognize that the
cumulative effects from past and present natural disasters and/or terrorist acts
might exacerbate employees' symptoms.
In other words, your company might be dealing with multiple traumatic events that surface and are triggered by one critical event. This poses a heightened challenge to your company and what you
might be dealing with should a large earthquake occur.
As talk and preparation for the next big earthquake transpire, you want to not only ensure the safety of your
employees but also your company's ability to return to pre-incident levels of
productivity in a reasonable amount of time.
In order to facilitate recovery, it is important to remember that a
major earthquake or other natural disaster triggers emotional upheaval and
leaves residual trauma symptoms even after the event is over. For this reason
companies must include a post-disaster debriefing or decompression meeting
where these symptoms can be acknowledged and addressed.
To retrofit your Trauma Response Plan, be sure to include these components:
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Education about trauma and its psychological
effects
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Duties and responsibilities of
employees during a crisis
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Knowledge about intervention
strategies to decrease psychological distress
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Communication plans
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Access to outside resources such as
mental health, legal, insurance.
We can't expect corporate America to have the experience and
exposure to traumatic events that fire fighters and police are exposed to every
day, but on an individual level you can formulate a basic Trauma Response Plan
for your company that will foster a speedy recovery - no matter the disaster.
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________________________________________________
,
Thank you for taking the time to read this month's Trauma Talk. We hope you have found the information useful. If there are any topics you would like to see featured in a future
article of Trauma Talk, please let us know and we
will do our best to address them. We appreciate your comments, stories,
and thoughts as they will help us further refine and enrich our newsletter to benefit you.
Until our next talk, stay healthy and be prepared!
Warmly,
The Trauma Team
Trauma Outreach Associates, Inc.
Phone: 415.772.9999
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In the next issue...
Psychological First Aid
415.772.9999
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Trauma