Peer Support team members are agency employees that are trained and certified in Peer Support and suicide prevention. Peer Support team members serve as the backbone of any Wellness Unit, and they advocate for a wellness culture and help destigmatize your agency, creating trust in the overall process and procedures.
Peer Support members should be diverse in the ways they serve the agency, in rank and in personal strengths, providing a wide variety of support that appeals to all members of the agency. Peer Support qualifications can vary depending on state law, but most often they will need certification and training.
Anchor Wellness can help you to develop departmental policies, train and certify peer team members, and give tips and tricks as to how to organize the team dynamic as well as communicate to the department as a whole what exactly Peer Support is and its benefits.
Agencies need a well-calculated and scientifically proven method of responding to the impact of trauma and critical incidents on its officers and staff. The response should be consistent and understood by supervisors and employee users alike. Oftentimes peer support team members can be trained to serve also as facilitators of critical incident debriefs and follow-up support. Policies are needed to outline this process and the responsibilities of the different employees so that all department members understand their roles and tasks accordingly.
We can create a “Critical Incident Matrix” that clearly outlines the various call types that could trigger a critical incident response so supervisors and others know when it is most useful to offer this support. Training is also helpful to supervisors who often ask for help or tools so they might be proactive in watching out for the safety and wellness of first responders under their command.
Law enforcement agencies specifically need a strategic plan and prepared response for the worst-case scenario of an agency line of duty death or serious injury. Anchor Wellness can help you organize a line of duty death policy that outlines the department's response that includes the do’s and don’ts of action. Agencies should consider how they plan to communicate with families of fallen officers and how to best help families with line of duty death benefits, financial hardships, funeral arrangements, and so forth.
We can create a Line of Duty Death form that allows officers to pre-plan arrangements, share important documents, outline active insurance policies, and provide information on financial accounts. This form also allows officers to specifically name the department member that they wish to be a liaison to their family in the worst-case scenario.
Chaplain services are a much-needed support within agencies. Unfortunately, oftentimes chaplains are asked to perform support duties outside of their scope of education and practice due to the overwhelming needs for care. A streamlined wellness program sets aside a few very necessary functions of Chaplains and allows a clear line between spiritual care and trauma care.
Oftentimes religious affiliations and/or resistance to religious institutions can automatically create barriers to first responders and their families reaching out for help. It is important that Chaplains are vetted with training and certifications as well and understand their role in the larger wellness structure so that the various parts of support can function to complement each other.
Agencies need to be connected to culturally competent local mental health providers that understand the unique impact of a high-impact career on first responders and families. For example, at a law enforcement agency, we began to offer an in-house 2-hour training for any professional provider that was interested. Therapists could come and tour the department, attend a training on law enforcement culture and ride out with an officer on patrol.
This process allowed us to better vet individuals who were best prepared to serve the officers and created lasting relationships with the professional counseling community around us to help us seamlessly make referrals when needed. We set up 12 “preferred providers” and two agreements with local clinics that allowed them to bill the agency directly and cover the costs of services for officers in crisis.
Apps and other technology-assisted ways to organize wellness and provide resources are a convenient way to get resources in the hands of officers in real time. It’s important that resources are readily available to first responders in the moment of need. If they have to jump through too many hoops or if they have to research options, the chances that they will follow through in helping themselves tend to drop significantly.
Wellness apps can be cost effective and provide 24/7 suicide prevention helplines, a direct link to peer support and other professional helpers, a library of self-assessments and other important podcast/article-based support on a wide variety of wellness topics.
One of the best ways a wellness unit can function to improve the overall culture of an agency is to offer insight into trauma impact and need for resources from the very beginning of a first responder’s career. At one law enforcement agency, we implemented four hours of wellness training taught by peer support members or other peers within the agency within weeks of the hiring of new officers.
We automatically pair new hires with wellness resources and peer support even while attending training. We make a concerted effort to make initial contact with new hire families within weeks of employment. All of these programs are designed to increase employee retention and help normalize for new first responders for the unique stressors of a high-impact career.