10 August 2009

University to help West Bank children deal with trauma

The University of Dundee is to help ensure that children in Dundee’s twin city of Nablus receive the appropriate assistance to deal with the trauma of growing up in a region regularly beset by war.

The University is one of the partners in a project, led by the Centre for Applied Research in Education (CARE) Ramallah, to train school counsellors to identify, assess and treat the symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Traumatic Grief.

Ian Barron, from the University’s School of Education, Social Work and Community Education, has been instrumental in establishing the project to help children in one of the world’s most conflict-prone zones deal with traumatic experiences.

He was asked by CARE Ramallah for advice about how to equip school counsellors with the tools necessary to allow them to help children who may have witnessed violence, narrowly escaped death, or who may have seen family and friends die as a result of the long-running conflict.

Ian utilised contacts within the world-renowned Children and War Foundation (CAW), and two experts from the Norway-based organisation will provide the training for an initial batch of 20 school counsellors from across the West Bank. This initial cohort will gather in Nablus later this month to receive their training.

If successful, they will then act as trainers for a further 230 candidates. It is hoped that within three years every school in the West Bank will have a counsellor trained to CAW standards.

Ian will evaluate the project to ensure its efficacy and to inform future initiatives to help children deal with the trauma of war or disaster situations.

He explained that there were three main symptoms of PTSD displayed by children who have first-hand experience of conflict or natural disaster. 'The first is hyperarousal - elevated levels of anxiety, panic or terror,' he said.

'The second is avoidance, which causes them to avoid bomb blasts sites, places where soldiers might be etc to the point that their world closes in. Even their homes become unsafe places. They may also dissociate, a process which is part of body’s survival mechanism and which sees the brain switch off to the trauma and cut off their feelings.'

'The third aspect to look out for is intrusion - flashbacks occur when the trauma is hotwired into the child’s brain. Images can be triggered by everyday events which are similar in some small way to the original traumatic experience'.

'A fourth symptom we must look for is traumatic grief, which occurs when the experience is so traumatic that the child becomes stuck in the moment of trauma and is unable to grieve.'

Ian previously set up the St Andrew’s Trauma Therapy Service in Jerusalem and Bethlehem and it was during this time that he first met Dr Ghassan Abdallah from CARE Ramallah. Ian suggested that the CAW, as world-leaders in assessing children’s traumatic experiences, may be able to help establish the project.

The organisation has created a Recovery Manual for the teaching of trauma recovery techniques - accepted as the gold standard internationally – that will be used to teach the school counsellors in the West Bank.

Ian continued, 'I will travel to Nablus on August, 17, 18 and 19 when the training begins to see how the manual is rolled out. This project can have a significant impact on the lives of children who have lived through the most traumatic experiences imaginable.'

'I will be responsible for evaluating outcomes to see if there has been a reduction in the symptoms of PTSD, based on feedback from the child, parents and teachers. Evidence from the use of this manual for training in Greece, Iran and Turkey demonstrates the effectiveness of this approach.'

Ian is also a partner in another project led by CARE aiming to help children in Gaza deal with their traumatic experiences. Entitled “Healing Trauma, Combating Hatred”, the scheme has been developed by CARE in conjunction with local psychologists and takes into account the specific needs of Gaza by working at a community rather than individual level.

For media enquiries contact:
Grant Hill
Press Officer
University of Dundee
Nethergate Dundee, DD1 4HN
TEL: 01382 384768
E-MAIL: g.hill@dundee.ac.uk