Human Trafficking: Addressing the Chiasmic Training Gap Through a Train-the-Trainers Model

Abstract

Human trafficking is a global health problem, affecting the health of men, women, and children, and disproportionately affecting marginalized populations. At some point during their exploitation, those who experience trafficking will likely have contact with a health professional. 1 Unfortunately, many trafficking survivors report that contact with health professionals did not lead to safety and healing: their exploitation was not identified, they felt judged, or they feared arrest or/deportation. A holistic response to trafficking in the health care setting is critical, involving multidisciplinary coordination including social work, nursing, midlevel providers, and physicians. 2,3 The health care workforce is comprised of millions of practicing clinicians who have not been trained on responses to trafficking. Moreover, trafficking is not routinely a part of medical curricula. 4 Given the fact that trafficking is just beginning to come onto medicine's radar, there are very few individuals with the combination of expertise in teaching skills and trauma-informed clinical trafficking approaches. 4 Simply put, there is a chiasmic gap between those health professionals who are and are not competent in caring for trafficked people and few people qualified to train them. 4

PEARR tool training and implementation: building awareness of violence and human trafficking in a hospital system

“…This includes evaluating staff education on various types of abuse, neglect, and violence, including human trafficking, and the use of the PEARR Tool in intervention efforts. Health professionals must be educated on violence, including labor trafficking and sex trafficking; otherwise, they will not be equipped to identify patients who might benefit from the assistance provided via the PEARR Tool ( 22 ).…”