Psychosocial First Aid to Immigrant Victims of Single Traumatic Occupational Events and of Community Violence, Crime, and Severe Traffic Accidents: Some Practical Guidelines

A substantial part of trauma affected migrants needs extra psycho-social assistance apart from the normal support they receive: so called psychosocial aid. Specially trained co-workers or managers, victims support workers sometimes feel insecure about affected immigrant workers or clients when providing first psychosocial assistance or peer-support. They do not know if the psychosocial aid they give is useful for these groups. Are the methods and models they use comparatively effective to affected immigrants? Based on current literature (e.g. Arends To´th, 2003; Bhugra et al., 2006; Drogendijk et al, 2005, 2010; Knipscheer et al, 2007, 2009) seven themes can be distinguished which can be of importance in the first psychosocial aid of ethnic minority victims: The influence of culture and religion of the victim, the refugee status, vulnerability to psychological problems, needs of availability of social support, (un)realistic expectancies, recognition of the traumatic experience, and ethnic matching. In psychosocial aid the needs of the victim are always the starting point regardless of ethnicity. This implies that any background of a victim has to be taken into account (Drogendijk & Kleber, 2010). However, knowledge of these themes can be very helpful to understand and support an affected colleague, employee or client and raise awareness of the own background.