Interventions following a critical incident: developing a critical incident stress management team

This article describes the development and implementation of a stress management model for assisting hospital staff after critical incidents using an adaptation of Mitchell's model (J. Mitchell, 1983). A survey was conducted following the first major incident using M. Horowitz, N. Wilner, and W. Alvarez's (1979) Impact of Event Scale 10 days after and again 6 weeks following the incident to measure its emotional impact on staff. Outcomes included being symptom-free of critical incident stress after a 3-month period. The interventions were intended to help staff at a large metropolitan multispecialty hospital in Queensland in the immediate period following critical incidents. The implications of this program indicated the importance of emotional support at critical times for health professionals.