Postdisaster Counselling: Personal, Professional, and Ethical Issues

Abstract

This paper examines the experiences of specialist volunteer mental health counsellors establishing and managing an early intervention service. This research investigates personal, professional and ethical issues faced by volunteer counsellors following the 2011 earthquakes in the Canterbury region of New Zealand. Earthquakes create major community disruption resulting in scarce resources requiring new agency arrangements and increased use of volunteers to manage and provide services. Volunteer counsellors working with the Canterbury Charity Hospital were interviewed about the personal, professional, and ethical issues they faced in providing early intervention services. The earthquake exposed counsellors to personal challenges in their own lives as well as those of their clients and significantly affected their professional practice. The findings indicate that emergency organizations and professional registration bodies should give further consideration to the management of volunteers and their early intervention work in post-disaster counselling. Implications • Delivery of post disaster services must encompass service management, targeted interventions and supervision.• When counsellors and clients experience the same disaster personal, professional and ethical aspects are intertwined. Counsellors need self-care and support to manage these events.• Further enhancement of professional insurance is sought for volunteer counsellors post disaster.

Post-disaster social work research: A scoping review of the evidence for practice

“…Of note is that many of these studies were conducted by researchers located outside of the country where the disaster occurred (Becker, 2009; Benson et al, 2016; Cooper et al, 2018; Dominelli, 2014, 2015; Doostgharin, 2009; Drolet et al, 2018; Huang and Wong, 2013; Huang et al, 2014; Larson et al, 2015; Pentaraki, 2013; Powell and Leytham, 2014; Sim et al, 2013; Vickers and Dominelli, 2015). Studies of disasters in Australia, Barbados, Finland, Hong Kong, South Korea, Taiwan and the United States were conducted by researchers from within those countries (Bell, 2008; Chae et al, 2005; First et al, 2018; Fogel, 2017; Harms et al, 2015; Hawkins and Maurer, 2010; Hickson and Lehmann, 2014; Kranke et al, 2017; Kreuger and Stretch, 2003; Kulkarni et al, 2008; Leitch et al, 2009; Lemieux et al, 2010; Liu and Mishna, 2014; Marlowe, 2015; Plummer et al, 2008; Prost et al, 2018; Pyles, 2011; Rapeli, 2018; Rock and Corbin, 2007; Tang and Cheung, 2007; Tosone et al, 2015, 2016; Tudor et al, 2015).…”

“…Further research into the elements that would create a robust organisational infrastructure including clear policies and procedures around immediate response to a disaster is critical within social workers' own organisations. Understanding their roles and responsibilities supports the maintenance of personal and professional boundaries, further ensuring protection of social workers themselves (Cooper et al, 2018). International conversations around best practice in preparation for social work organisations could add considerable impetus to disaster readiness of the social work community.…”

“…In this post-recovery response, many of the systems and supports that are typically in place were not initially present. However, supervision, debriefing, and documentation of learning were all recognised as valuable and necessary for the counsellors and were put in place on the run (Cooper et al, 2018).…”

“…Of the 15 articles that focus on social work interventions: five discuss psychosocial care and therapy (Becker, 2009;Bell, 2008;Benson et al, 2016;Cooper et al, 2018;Hickson and Lehmann, 2014); five articles focus on aid work (Alipour et al, 2015;Dominelli, 2014Dominelli, , 2015Drolet et al, 2018;Kulkarni et al, 2008); another four look at group work (Huang and Wong, 2013;Larson et al, 2015;Powell and Leytham, 2014;Tudor et al, 2015); and one article examines community work (Tudor et al, 2015).…”

Educating Social Workers in the Midst of COVID-19: The Value of a Principles-led Approach to Designing Educational Experiences during the Pandemic

“…However, inflexible approaches to practice often cannot be applied in disaster situations. When disasters occur, social workers who are deployed to work with affected communities typically find themselves in makeshift work environments where they need to be able to adapt to working in less-than-ideal conditions, without proper offices or communication systems ( Cooper et al , 2018 ). Yet, these less-than-ideal working conditions can provide excellent opportunities for student learning, provided students and placement providers are willing to and capable of making adaptations.…”