CISM Initiative

A volunteer team of public safety and affiliate professionals serving fire, EMS, law enforcement, industry, educations and other organizations involved in any type of critical incident.

Who is CISM?

The Western Ohio CISM Team is a volunteer based organization providing peer support to public safety agencies, educational institutions, industry, and others who have experienced some form of critical incident. All of the team members volunteer their time to provide initial response and supportive intervention to people who have been exposed to a triggering event, and who find themselves dealing with the aftermath of such exposure.

Confidential services provided at no charge:

Pre-Incident Stress Education
Individual Peer Support
Crisis Management Briefing
Defusing
Debriefing
Follow-Up
Referral

When are they called?

What happens when the are called?

We recommend that these incidents should be an "AUTOMATIC CALL OUT". This means that the critical incident response team should always be contacted for each of the following events:

Serious injury or line of duty death
Suicide of a colleague
Use of force with serious injury or death
Death of a child

These incidents for which you should consider contacting the critical incident response team to elicit recommendations for intervention:

A prolonged event, wit negative results
Incident wit extensive media attention
Incident charged with profound emotion
Incident with significant community impact

The team brings with it professionals who are trained and follow a specified protocol to ensure continuity and consistency with our actions and message. The team works with the impacted audiences, administration, and staff to facilitate the distribution of information about stress, stress reactions, and making healthy choices following an event. The team responds when requested by a person of authority to support their organization or institution and related individuals, and tries to help them return to a new normal as quickly as possible.