| Description |
Human trafficking presents an important issue in medical practice. In the United States; alone, approximately 18,000 individuals are victims of trafficking annually (Baldwin, Eisenman, Sayles, Ryan & Chuang, 2011). Many of these victims seek medical treatment in settings such as emergency rooms, urgent care, primary care, dental clinics, reproductive and sexual health, and alternative healers (Chisolm-Straker et al., 2016). Rollins, Gribble, Barrett, and Powell (2017) cite a study where 88 percent of victims sought medical care while being trafficked, but of those, none were identified as trafficking victims, nor offered assistance.; Providers acknowledge an educational gap related to human trafficking. It is common to encounter trafficking victims, but their identification goes unnoticed. Though physicians recognize the significance of trafficking, most are unaware of the scope of the problem. A 2015 study by Tichen and colleagues discusses the importance of providers learning to recognize the clinical characteristics of trafficking victims (as cited in Goldberg, Moore, Houck, Kaplan, & Barron, 2017). Another study showed that 29 percent of emergency personnel acknowledged that human trafficking was a problem in their area of care, but only 13 percent of participants felt confident in their ability to identify a victim (Rollins et al., 2017). Of these participants, just 3 percent had received training to recognize victims (Rollins et al., 2017). "Health care providers who are educated about the risk factors and clinical manifestations of human trafficking, and who can provide efficient and compassionate assistance to patients, have the potential to play a key role in addressing this age-old yet newly recognized problem" (Alpert et al., 2014). |
