Best Practices for Trauma-Informed Care
- Heather Proctor
- 3 days ago
- 3 min read
March 9, 2026
Heather Proctor, Author, Trauma-Informed Process Improvement Specialist
Reviewed by Tim Lineaweaver, Subject Matter Expert
Trauma can be a life-changing experience. It can happen to anyone at any age and may affect an individual's daily life and cause long-lasting harm to their physical and mental health and well-being. An individual, a generation, or an entire community or culture may experience traumatic events.
Trauma recovery and healing are possible through appropriate and adequate individual, family, and community support. Best practices for trauma-informed care center around creating safe, trustworthy, and collaborative environments, emphasizing safety, trustworthiness, choice, collaboration, and empowerment while recognizing the impact of trauma and avoiding re-traumatization.
Trauma-informed care (TIC) is a framework that acknowledges the impact of trauma on individuals and aims to create safe, supportive, and healing environments. It emphasizes understanding "what happened to you" rather than "what is wrong with you" and seeks to avoid re-traumatization.
Many individuals who seek treatment in behavioral health settings have histories of trauma, but they often do not recognize the significant effects of trauma in their lives; either they do not draw connections between their trauma histories and their presenting problems, or they avoid the topic altogether.
Likewise, treatment providers may not ask questions that elicit a client's history of trauma, may feel unprepared to address trauma-related issues proactively, or may struggle to address traumatic stress effectively within the constraints of their treatment program, the program's clinical orientation, or their agency's directives.
By recognizing that traumatic experiences and their sequelae are closely related to behavioral health problems, front-line professionals and community-based programs can begin to build a trauma-informed environment across the continuum of care.
Key steps include meeting client needs in a safe, collaborative, and compassionate manner; preventing treatment practices that retraumatize people with histories of trauma who are seeking help or receiving services; building on the strengths and resilience of clients in the context of their environments and communities; and endorsing trauma-informed principles in agencies through support, consultation, and supervision of staff.
Author Heather Proctor is the founder and CEO of WeHealUS, which provides individual and collective support to promote healing-center reform throughout the United States. She has dedicated her life to serving others in various capacities, including consulting for businesses, marketing, health and wellness, and life. Heather leads a national mental health and trauma awareness movement by engaging healthcare organizations, businesses, and government agencies to offer free resources and training.
According to Heather Proctor:
Understanding the direct link between trauma, mental health, and healing is the triad of transformation and growth. When we begin to understand how our past trauma directly affects our current mental health and how we move through our healing journey, we not only understand ourselves better but also those around us. This resonates deeply in all relationships, including those with coworkers, family, and friends.
To further illustrate this triad of transformation and growth, I've created a visual representation of the healing journey that outlines how past trauma influences our mental health and shapes our path toward ongoing healing.
One of the most impactful experiences I have had with this understanding was working in public housing. This time in my life was forever changed as I experienced trauma every day at work, assisting residents who had severe mental health issues, violence, and drugs. My safety was always an issue. During my time here, I underwent TIC training for the first time. This revolutionized my view of the residents, as I came to know many of their stories and how they had arrived at this point.
I had one resident in particular who was always causing trouble. I got to know her well since I had to see her frequently to address her behavior. She was one of my residents, where it was no secret that she had a drug problem. One day, she came into my office with a box containing picture frames. This moment was probably one of the most surreal turning points for me in understanding trauma, the effects of trauma, and addiction. She lifted a photo of a young boy and said, " This is my son. When he was 8 years old, he hanged himself in a tree. All I could think was that if I were in her shoes, I didn't know what I would do, not justifying her behavior, but in a space of compassion, empathy, and connection.
Our mental health and how we navigate life are directly connected to our past trauma. Trauma-informed awareness is the piece that helps us recognize, reflect on, and work through our mental health. Through this realization, our lens of healing can transform not only our own lives but also those around us.
To learn more about Heather Proctor's work, please visit her website at https://www.wehealus.org/
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