Critical incident stress management (CISM) has long been recognized as a best practice in supporting first responders following exposure to traumatic or high-stress events. CISM emerged in the 1980s as a structured, peer-supported approach to stabilize and mitigate the psychological impact of traumatic events on first responders. Core components such as pre-incident education, defusings, critical incident stress debriefings (CISDs), one-on-one peer crisis intervention, and referral to professional services, were designed to normalize stress reactions and reduce the risk of long-term psychological harm.¹ For decades, CISM programs have been widely adopted across law enforcement, fire services, emergency medical services, and dispatch, with a heavy focus on defusings and debriefings. Organizations such as the International Association of Chiefs of Police and the U.S. Department of Justice have recognized the importance of post-incident psychological support following suicides, mass casualty events, officer-involved shootings, and line-of-duty deaths.²

However, the effectiveness of any best practice is contingent on its feasibility. In today’s policing environment, characterized by staffing shortages, increased call volume, mandated overtime, and continuing stigma surrounding mental health, many agencies struggle to consistently implement CISM interventions as designed. The Washtenaw County, Michigan, CISM team encountered these challenges firsthand. When deputies are running from call to call, there is no time for a defusing. When shift schedules do not align, it is difficult to hold a debriefing within the preferred 72-hour post-incident period.³ When a debriefing does manage to get scheduled, it never fails to be a time when someone should be sleeping, needs to be in court, or has other commitments. Over time, it became clear that agency leaders needed to rethink how they were delivering support. The agency hasn’t abandoned defusings and debriefings but has shifted toward the more personalized aspects of CISM interventions, namely pre-incident education and one-on-one crisis intervention.

Why Debriefings Often Do Not Happen

Agencies across the United States are continuously operating under strain from staffing shortages. Research shows that 87 percent of police departments across the United States are not fully staffed.⁴ Emergency dispatch centers face the same problem, with 74 percent of centers declaring that they are understaffed.⁵ When agencies do not have enough personnel, the deputies, officers, and dispatchers working that shift have to immediately move on to the next call. There is no opportunity to pull them out of service to conduct a defusing. Late runs and overtime assignments frequently hinder the ability to hold a defusing at the end of a shift.

In order to access the rest of the article sign in with your IACP or Subscriber credentials.