Trauma Informed Care: A Guide for Nursing and Midwifery Practice

This practical guide introduces and critically examines the concept of trauma informed care, exploring how it can be implemented in everyday nursing and midwifery practice across a range of settings. Supporting nurses and midwives to integrate trauma informed knowledge and practice into their work, this comprehensive book begins with an overview of what trauma means. It looks at theories of trauma and the neuroscience of trauma and memory. It discusses the diagnostics of trauma and considers how trauma impacts relationships (including those within healthcare settings), and health, illness, and recovery. It also investigates how trauma can affect people differently across the lifespan and contexts.

The second part of the book builds on the first, focusing on how an understanding of trauma can inform nursing and midwifery practice across settings. It looks at promoting safety in interpersonal relationships, navigating interventions, talking about trauma, responding after potentially traumatic events, and responding to trauma, self-care, and systemic challenges. This book provides essential knowledge around trauma informed care relevant to nurses and midwives, and uses a range of approaches to help readers transfer learning to their own practice.

It is an essential guide for nurses and midwives in practice and in training across the full range of practice settings.

Sophie Isobel is an Associate Professor in the School of Nursing, Faculty of Medicine and Health at the University of Sydney, Australia.