How To Respectfully Engage Survivors of Human Trafficking

Why engage survivors in anti-trafficking initiatives?

Survivors of human trafficking are invaluable partners for healthcare providers seeking to assist trafficked children. Whether you are planning a formal anti-trafficking program, advocacy initiative or research project, or are hoping to improve care for trafficked children in your practice, engaging survivors is imperative to ensure initiatives are impactful and trauma sensitive. Healthcare providers have much to learn from human trafficking survivors. Survivors are experts, and many have had informative experiences with healthcare. Consulting with survivor experts allows initiatives to have the maximum potential for benefitting future trafficking survivors by utilizing these prior experiences to reduce undue trauma by healthcare providers and foster therapeutic environments.

Best Practices for Engaging with Survivors

Prior to engaging survivors in healthcare initiatives, it is important to keep in mind key best practices in order to facilitate an equal partnership, the appropriate respect for their expertise, and to reduce any potential re-traumatization as a result of their consultation services. Below are resources you may utilize to familiarize yourself with important considerations when working with survivor experts. Key points in working with survivors include conveying respect as equal partners, reducing re-traumatization, providing compensation when possible, and respecting confidentiality.

1. The Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking In Persons within the U.S. State Department created a resource fact sheet with the “Do’s” and “Dont’s” of engaging survivors of human trafficking.
2. The Responsible Sourcing Tool includes a resource on the benefits of engaging survivors, information on best practices, examples of the topics of survivor expertise, as well as resources for finding potential survivor partners. 
3. The “Toolkit for Building Survivor Informed Organizations” from the Office on Trafficking in Persons and the National Human Trafficking Training and Technical Assistance Center is a comprehensive document that outlines building trauma-informed relationships with survivors to benefit initiatives. 
4. The “Trauma Informed Code of Conduct for Working with Survivors of Human Trafficking” by the Helen Bamber Foundation is an important document that outlines the foundation of a trauma-informed professional relationship that healthcare providers should abide by when working with survivors of human trafficking.
5. The importance and context of compensating survivor partners as expert consultants, when possible, is an important best practice. The following article from Delta 8.7 is a resource for understanding and justifying use of funds for these purposes. 

Where to Start

The following are local and national resources that you can utilize to identify survivor leaders/experts to partner with.

Local:

• County and/or State Human Trafficking Task Force/Coalitions
• Anti-trafficking organizations, and/or peer mentor programs for trafficking survivors in your city or state
  • Many anti-trafficking organizations are listed on the National Human Trafficking Hotline Directory.
• Local homeless youth services organizations, group homes, child advocacy centers and juvenile justice centers

National:

• National Survivor Network
• HEAL Trafficking
• The Voices of Hope Initiative