From Critical Incident to Mass Casualty: AIP and disaster mental health

with Marlene Kenney, MA, LICSW

Online, Saturday December 7 2024

With 6 EMDR UK CPD Points

The East Anglia regional EMDR group was thrilled to welcome Marlene Kenney from the US for a day’s online exploration of best practice in EMDR-informed response to critical incidents.

We’ll be posting here shortly a full account of how the day unfolded, and in the meantime he’s a reminder of the background.

Marlene is an EMDRIA-certified consultant and Group Traumatic Episode/Recent Traumatic Episode Accredited trainer.

She has managed teams in response to the Boston Marathon Bombing, mass shootings, deaths by suicide and other critical incidents in the US.

She is the director of disaster mental health for First Aid of the Soul, a Ukraine-focused mental health organization and has worked with communities in the Philippines.

Participants were introduced to the core pillars of AIP informed disaster mental health, Psychological First Aid, EMDR Early Intervention theory and practice, and the underlying frameworks of responding to any incident. The workshop used examples from Marlene’s expertise in responding to suicide loss as a community based critical incident.

Workshop goals and objectives

Participants were invited to learn how to:

1. Describe the eight core action steps of Psychological First Aid.
2. List three EMDR Early Intervention techniques.
3. Describe how to assess which type of Group EMDR to use.
4. Define Early Intervention EMDR.
5. Describe three approach variables to consider when responding to a critical incident.
6. Increase understanding of the principles of Group Traumatic Episode.
7. Explain the rationale for working with an episode as practiced with group EMDR.
8. Define AIP approach to suicide loss.
9. Define suicide postvention.