{"id":591035,"date":"2026-08-12T15:06:12","date_gmt":"2026-08-12T15:06:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/591035\/"},"modified":"2026-08-12T15:06:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-12T15:06:12","slug":"asylum-staff-at-risk-of-anxiety-and-depression-from-traumatic-cases","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/591035\/","title":{"rendered":"Asylum staff at risk of anxiety and depression from traumatic cases"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Staff processing asylum applications are at risk of anxiety, depression and insomnia because of exposure to traumatic personal stories and graphic material.<\/p>\n<p>A formal risk assessment at the International Protection Office (IPO) said staff could suffer emotional distress and \u201cempathy fatigue\u201d because of the nature of their work.<\/p>\n<p>It said psychological injuries could build up over time or result from a single significant exposure to very disturbing material.<\/p>\n<p>The assessment gave the hazard a high-risk rating before safeguards were considered to help staff cope with challenges at work.<\/p>\n<p>Internal documents said employees could be exposed to traumatic material while interviewing, reading case files, or viewing images.<\/p>\n<p>It explained how somebody giving their life story in person could be much more difficult than simply reading their file.<\/p>\n<p>The risk assessment said: \u201cHearing a personal account is different to reading about it or peer reviewing someone else\u2019s report.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Measures in place to protect staff included rotating them away from sensitive material and taking account of how many cases of a particular type they dealt with.<\/p>\n<p>Officials were also offered time buffers between interviews. \u201cThis is particularly important after a difficult encounter,\u201d said the risk analysis.<\/p>\n<p>Trigger warnings were also placed on files involving highly sensitive material like domestic violence, according to records released under FOI.<\/p>\n<p>A separate action plan said officials were examining ways to reduce exposure to disturbing digital content, including the greyscaling of graphic images and the possible use of AI tools.<\/p>\n<p>Other proposals discussed in the documents included weekly team debriefs, one-to-one wellbeing sessions, specialist trauma support and the refurb of a staff wellness room.<\/p>\n<p>One risk assessment said steps should be taken to minimise the number of personnel \u201crequired to view graphic images&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"not-prose no-underline\" data-action=\"click\" data-category=\"Read more article clicked\" data-label=\"https:\/\/www.breakingnews.ie\/ireland\/i-feel-ive-let-him-down-father-devastated-after-hse-group-rejects-funding-for-sons-drug-1939073.html\" data-value=\"1\" href=\"https:\/\/www.breakingnews.ie\/ireland\/i-feel-ive-let-him-down-father-devastated-after-hse-group-rejects-funding-for-sons-drug-1939073.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><\/p>\n<p>        <img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/coady-boys-e1786521825158.jpeg\" class=\"rounded-sm object-contain bg-transparent z-10 w-full h-full not-prose\" alt=\"'I Feel I\u2019ve Let Him Down': Father Devastated After Hse Group Rejects Funding For Son'S Drug\" width=\"278\" height=\"156\" \/><\/p>\n<p>        Ireland<\/p>\n<p>&#8216;I feel I\u2019ve let him down&#8217;: Father devastated after HSE group rejects funding for son&#8217;s drug<\/p>\n<p><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Asked about the records, a Department of Justice spokesperson said the health and wellbeing of staff was a \u201ctop priority&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>They said: \u201cUnder the Department\u2019s health and safety risk management system, the International Protection Office (IPO) division has been allocated a medium rating for residual risk.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cA medium rating is an internal indicator that ensures psychological hazards continue to receive ongoing attention and regular monitoring by managers, senior leadership and the Department\u2019s Health and Safety Unit.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The spokesperson added that around \u20ac15,000 had been spent over the past three years on a confidential support and counselling service for IPO staff and panel members.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Staff processing asylum applications are at risk of anxiety, depression and insomnia because of exposure to traumatic personal&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":591036,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[103,61,60,410,411],"class_list":["post-591035","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mental-health","tag-health","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-mental-health","tag-mentalhealth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591035","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=591035"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591035\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/591036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=591035"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=591035"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=591035"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}