Professional Development...

5th Annual Human Trafficking Symposium

Why Should Health Care Professional Present & Attend? Creating human trafficking awareness among professional communities of practice is a first step in recognizing human trafficking as a public health issue. Medical professionals are uniquely positioned to help trafficking victims since studies claim that anywhere from 50% to 80% of human trafficking victims have seen a healthcare provider at some point during their trafficked existence (Schwarz, et al., 2016, p. 182; Waugh, 2018, ⁋ 8). When one of their ‘girls’ needs medical attention, traffickers tend to use walk-in clinics or emergency rooms and insist on staying with trafficking victims and paying in cash. Learning to separate the patient-victim from the supposed-trafficker allows the doctor or nurse time to talk individually and to ask questions while examining the patient for bruises or additional indicators of abuse. The 5th Annual Symposium on Human Trafficking, Immigration, Child Protection, & Domestic Violence offers 2 days of knowledge sharing among professional community members desiring to learn how to recognize, respond, and address human trafficking within their professional disciplines.

References

Schwarz, C. Unruh, E, Cronin, K, Evans-Simpson, S. Britton, H. and Ramaswamy, M. (2016, June). Human trafficking identification and service provision in the medical and social service sectors. Health and Human Rights Journal, 18(1), pp.181-192.

Waugh, L. (2018, April 2018). Human trafficking and the healthcare system. Retrieved 03/010/2020 from https://www.ncsl.org/research/health/human-trafficking-and-the-health-care-system.aspx