Support for Health Care Professionals, Counsellors & Psychotherapists.

“The soul of a hospital resides in the awesome spirit of healing found there. That spirit might be reflected in the architecture and décor or in the attitude of those who work there. Many hospitals give the impression of being factories for rebuilding bodies rather than temples of health and healing, and that is another way of saying they lack soul.   A hospital with soul is a place of healing.  A hospital without soul is a body repair shop”..... (Moore, T. 2010)

Many of us are conscious of the pressures on our NHS and our clinicians, lack of resources, staff sickness and shortages, and working hours that are often challenging. Heart 2 Hart Healthcare Solutions is currently aiming towards achieving collaborative relationships with our healthcare providers through communication and education; a trauma informed care approach, embracing a more emotionally intelligent method. This is a strengths-based, organizational framework that recognizes the widespread impact of trauma or health anxiety. It provides a cultural shift around the nature of care, compassion and empathy as it actively works to create environments that promote safety, trust, empowerment, and healing (while avoiding re-triggering.) A system that recognizes how trauma and/or anxiety affects a person’s brain, body, and behaviour—and responds in ways that promote safety, trust, and healing instead of re-traumatization. In simpler terms, this means understanding that many people have experienced health anxiety, and shapes policies, interventions and systems that are sensitive to those experiences.

In an ideal world, a trauma informed care approach to medical trauma would help prevent a deterioration in mental health, medical trauma and medical anxiety. This approach acknowledges that health care organizations and care teams ideally need to have a complete picture of a patient’s life situation — past and present — in order to provide effective health care services with a healing orientation. Trauma-informed practice can potentially improve patient engagement, treatment adherence, and health outcomes, as well as patient and staff wellness, plus it can also help reduce avoidable care and excess costs for both the health care and social service sectors. (*1) Education, collaboration and communication at all stages of the medical process between patients and clinicians can be instrumental in physiological and psychological healing.

Colette is currently collaborating with American Author, Professor and Clinical Psychotherapist Dr Michelle Flaum who has been carrying out her own research into medical trauma in the US for some years resulting in many published articles and two books, and successful integrative interventions being used within therapy and the healthcare environment. In 2022 she developed the Certificate in Medical Trauma-Informed Care at Xavier University USA, which is the first training program of its kind world-wide, and which Colette completed in 2024.

We know that psychological intervention for Medical Trauma can help to calm patient anxiety and normalise their situation, enabling them to feel they are being treated holistically - both psychologically as well as physiologically. The intention is to provide awareness of a trauma informed care approach for those struggling with Medical Trauma, mirroring the US principals that psychological interventions prior to surgery, as well as access to support during recovery can prevent long term development of medical post-traumatic symptoms and medical trauma.

Continuing the theme of generating Medical Trauma awareness is an innovative training partnership approved by Cwm Taff Morgannwg Health Board which begins in October 2026, written and delivered by Colette. This introduces a medical trauma informed, compassion focused model of healthcare to staff, embracing a trauma-informed care approach, and putting the wellbeing of its healthcare professionals at its heart through inclusivity, collaboration, psycho-education and reflective conversation. This approach is unique in involving clinicians in their own training by listening to their needs and including the opportunity for them to have a voice, be heard and understood.

UK Medical Trauma training for Counsellors & Psychotherapists will also be available on-line from 2027.

(*1) https://www.traumainformedcare.chcs.org/what-is-trauma-informed-care/

The greatest mistake physicians make is that they attempt to cure the body without attempting to cure the mind, yet the mind and body are one and should not be treated separately...........  Plato.

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