Ch.23 in Richard Benjamin, Joan Haliburn and & Serena King, ed. Humanising Mental Health Care in Australia: A Guide to Trauma-Informed Approaches (London: Routledge, 2019), pp.307-318.
The context and environment in which health services are provided was long seen as the neutral backdrop to the service supplied. The paradigm of trauma-informed care challenges this assumption. Originating in the mental health sector but with society-wide implications, trauma-informed care stems from recognition that trauma is highly prevalent and that current organization of health and human services does not reflect this reality. This chapter introduces the core principles of trauma informed practice and the spectrum of institutional domains, formal and informal, in which they need to be implemented.