Counselling Course HCCS514A | Recognise And Respond To Individuals At Risk
Unit content breakdown:
1. Identify and assess the person’s current risk
- Recognise and respond to statements, reactions, thoughts, feelings or behaviours that indicate a person may be at risk
- Attend to any hunches, while listening as a helper, perhaps from indirect communications, that suggest the client may be at risk
- Ask directly about thoughts of suicide when there are grounds for concern
- Seek sufficient understanding of why the person is considering suicide, and what links them to life, to inform and facilitate the intervention
- Assess current suicide risk guided by risk assessment considerations and by whether there is an imminent threat to the person’s safety or that of others
2. Work actively with the person to reduce the immediate risk and increase safety
- Build a collaborative empathic relationship with person at risk
- Listen to what contributed to the critical incident and affirm and strengthen links to safety and living implicit in the helping relationship
- Work with person at risk to identify and agree actions to reduce immediate danger and mobilise emergency assistance, including medical help as needed
- Address and reduce risk to caregivers and others and remain mindful of circumstances where the police may need to be involved
- Seek advice from supervisors to ensure action taken is lawful, complies with good crisis intervention practice, organisation policies, ethical processes and duty of care obligations
- Address OHS obligations in relation to managing self and others
3. Provide referral for crisis intervention support
- Encourage and enable capacity of person at risk to make informed choices about further help that deals with their crisis and needs for care
- Acknowledge how the current helping relationship has provided foundations for further care
- Explore and seek to address any barriers to seeking or accepting help
- Develop with the individual, a plan to access and use informal supports and professional help
- Refer to appropriate community services and/or health professionals as required
You will acquire knowledge of:
- Common indicators or signs of potential risk
- Principles of crisis intervention, including relevant laws, ethical guidelines and policy requirements that support good care
- Policy around critical incidents and duty of care
- Procedures for obtaining assistance and making referrals to other staff or agencies
- Procedures for facilitating emergency interventions
- Awareness of personal values, beliefs and attitudes which may facilitate or impede crisis care and suicide intervention
- Examination of common notions about suicide
- Commitment to attend to the pain of the person at risk and work towards safe, life sustaining outcomes
- Principles of self care and support-seeking relevant to involvement in work involving responding to indications of crisis and suicidality
Skills gained
The focus is learning to identify and manage immediate risk in the context of a supportive helping relationship that works collaboratively with the person at risk to achieve safe outcomes. On module completion you will be able to:
- Recognise and respond appropriately to signs that indicate an individual may be at risk
- Demonstrate the capacity to work competently and independently according to the principles of effective practice
- Demonstrate accountability for your own professional conduct including: carrying out assigned tasks, working effectively under the pressure of crisis situations, maintaining the quality of services, strengthening links to life-sustaining options and supports to individuals in crisis, demonstrating a commitment to attend to the pain of persons considering or affected by suicide and to work toward safe, life-affirming outcomes
- Make referrals or provide access to emergency medical help
- Seek, integrate and apply learning from supervision and support
Contact us today for more information about this counselling course.