Critical Incident Stress Management
Employee Assistance Program offers short-term counseling, referral, monitoring, and follow-up in our private offices.

At any given time, 20% of employees have personal problems that impact their job. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, 30% of all absenteeism and 66% of all terminations are related to employees’ personal problems.

Critical Incident Stress Management

Critical Incident Stress Management (CISM) is a comprehensive, multi-component crisis intervention technique. CISM began within the emergency services (police, fire, paramedics) and is now utilized when any traumatic incident occurs at a work site. CISM is comprehensive due to its ability to span all stages of a critical incident. According to The International Critical Incident Stress Foundation, a critical incident can be defined as: any incident that causes personnel to have strong emotional reactions that have the ability to interfere with their ability to function in their current job function.

CISM covers all phases of a crisis from the pre-crisis stage to the post-crisis stage. The benefit of this model is that it can be utilized with individuals, small groups, large groups, families, organizations and even communities when a disaster occurs.

The seven core components of CISM are as follows:

  1. Pre-crisis preparation. This includes stress management and training for organizations to assist in prevention any large-scale crisis in the workplace.
  2. Disaster or large-scale incident, as well as, school and community programs including demobilization, informational briefings, and town hall meetings if a disaster occurs.
  3. Defusing. This phase includes three stages that are provided in a structured small group within hours of a crisis. Defusing allows assessment, triage and immediate referral as needed.
  4. Critical Incident Stress Debriefing (CISD). CISD refers to the “Mitchell Model” of structured group discussion usually provided 1 to 10 days after the critical incident. CISD is designed to mitigate acute symptoms, assess the need for follow-up, and if possible provide a sense of psychological closure.
  5. One-on-one crisis intervention. Individual counseling is provided as needed through the entire range of the crisis spectrum.
  6. Family crisis intervention or organizational consultation.
  7. Follow-up and referral. Referrals will be made for ongoing treatment as deemed necessary.

Northwest Beacon Group, LLC’s, Employee Assistance Program employs multiple clinicians that have attended the national CISM training. NWB EAP is able to provide immediate on-site support for companies to assist with any critical incident that has occurred.

For additional information, call 814/459-3272.