Health and Wellness

With a clearance from the doctors and a personal determination to return to work earlier this year, things were looking up for Nathalie until her employer decided they did not want to risk taking her back and abruptly terminated her employment cutting off all income and support. How shameful is that?

My mission is two-fold: bring awareness to all so that sufferers are no longer afraid to talk and ask for help; and PTSD brain imagemove both Canada and the United States to recognize PTSD as a presumptive illness for firefighters. PTSD is a brain injury that happens because of all that we see and have to deal with through our jobs as firefighters and medics.

During that year, more physical issues came to the surface. Feeling tired, yet unable to sleep; feeling irritable, aggressive, and anxious; nightmares and night terrors were surfacing and night sweats were now a normal nightly routine. If only I could get some sleep...but there was much more to come.

An emerging area of related study is on the topic of firefighters and officers being exposed to the Big Fire Truckgases and particulate matter from a source that’s found in every fire station around the world: the diesel-powered fire apparatus out in the apparatus bay. The exhaust from diesel engines contains a mixture of gases and very small particles that can create a health hazard when not properly controlled.

We'll go to the doctor when we feel flu-ish or feel a nagging pain. So why don’t we see a health professional when we feel emotional pain such as guilt, loss, loneliness?

In the USA you certainly have a very militaristic and I would say macho culture in your fire service. This is compounded by the public perception of fire fighters and the pedestal they put them on. (Don't get me wrong as a former fire fighter I hold all fire fighters in high esteem, but they need to realise [sic] they are not super human).

There will never be an absolute method for preventing exposure, but there are tactical measures that can lessen the exposure. With presumptive legislation available in many states to care for firefighters stricken by illness and disease, there will most likely come a day when that legislation WILL NOT be available if departments are not employing prevention standards. Just something to think about.

Station House provides those in need with the tools in treatment to do their jobs without life altering consequences and to take care of them, heal them, and make them well again so that they may return to help and heal others as the proud, brave and dedicated first responders that they are.

The company officer (first-line supervisor) is the toughest "gig" in any fire department, but too many of those officers make it harder than it needs to be by not wanting "to be the bad guy", i.e., the officer who follows policy and procedure and makes everyone else follow them as well.

I've been involved with firefighters and the stress reactions they experience for over 25 years, so the recent trend to using the PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder) term for all manner of stress reactions causes me concern. There is no doubt that firefighters and other first responders do sometimes experience PTSD. It has been my privilege to listen to several first responders who could be accurately diagnosed with PTSD. However, recent articles and “studies” purporting to be seeing PTSD in groups of firefighters are alarming in the use of rates for this diagnosis. A quick sample of these efforts indicates ranges form 17-24% of a cohort of firefighters who could be said to have PTSD.