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Occupational and environmental factors influencing morale of United States federal wildland firefighters
Abstract
Background Wildland firefighters have physically and psychologically demanding jobs that can result in social, economic and health-related stress. Previous studies have examined the physiological and physical effects of a career in wildland fire, but fewer studies have addressed psychological effects, and to date, none have directly analysed the hiring and work experiences of wildland firefighters. Aims We surveyed work experiences, health and well-being, and morale of wildland firefighters, explored factors that can improve recruitment and retention, and summarised broad patterns. Methods We conducted a voluntary anonymous survey of 708 federal wildland firefighters via an online platform over 2 months in 2022. Key results Respondents reported dissatisfaction with recruitment and hiring processes, low base salaries, poor mental health outcomes, and health and safety concerns. Respondents also reported the high importance of training, performance feedback and work environment to their retention in the field. We found significant effects of wildland firefighting on family status. Conclusions Wildland firefighters report experiencing low morale, financial stress, personal life strain and poor mental health outcomes. Implications These data provide a framework to establish future policy and research priorities and highlight the need for organisational actions and change.
... Previous studies of this workforce have focused nearly exclusively on operational wildland firefighters and have considered occupational hazards related to the physicality of the job (i.e., smoke, terrain, and extreme temperatures [1]). However, recent work on operational wildland firefighter mental health has found that aspects of the career can be emotionally and mentally detrimental, posited to be a result of several interacting factors including traumatic exposure, physical isolation, long irregular work schedules, low pay, and associated burnout [2]. To date, one single other study has specifically examined wildland fire dispatcher health and well-being: in a focus group of 11 wildland fire dispatchers, Palmer found that the three largest stressors that fire dispatchers experienced were balancing personal and professional lives, coping with job-related issues, and dealing with issues related to control [3]. ...
... For response variables, we used a Likert scale with 1 = strongly disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = neither agree nor disagree, 4 = agree, and 5 = strongly agree to assess the quality of mental health care resources and accessibility. All health care access and utilization questions were derived from Granberg et al.'s survey of operational wildland firefighters [2]. ...
Wildland fire dispatchers play a key role in wildland fire management and response organization; however, to date, wildland fire studies have largely focused on the physical hazards and, to a lesser extent, mental health hazards of wildland firefighting operational personnel, and dispatcher studies have primarily focused on 911 and police dispatchers. Studies of other dispatchers have provided some limited insight into potential strains impacting this workforce, including work-related fatigue, burnout, and traumatic exposure. However, the specific job hazards that are faced by wildland fire dispatchers are poorly understood. In 2023, we conducted a cross-sectional survey of 510 wildland fire dispatchers with questions about their occupational health, general health, and well-being. We used validated screening instruments to measure the rates of anxiety, depression, PTSD, and suicidal thoughts and ideation. Here, we also present the results of mental health and trauma exposure questions that were asked as part of a larger survey. We found that demographic factors were significant indicators of anxiety, depression, and binge/restrictive eating. Our data indicate that rates of anxiety, depression, PTSD, and suicidal thoughts and ideation are significantly higher for both the wildland fire dispatching workforce and other emergency responder populations than those of the general United States population.
As climates change, natural resource professionals are often working on the frontlines of intensifying environmental disasters, acting in both scientific and emergency response roles. One subset of this group, wildland firefighters often engage in multifaceted careers that incorporate elements of resource planning, conservation management, community disaster relief, and operational management. Despite these STEM roles and nearly half (48%) of them having earned at least a bachelor's degree, usually in a STEM field, wildland firefighters are almost exclusively lumped with emergency responders in the scientific literature. We surveyed 708 wildland firefighters with 9 open response questions as part of a larger survey asking about experiences and attitudes in the United States federal workplace. From their responses and voluntarily provided demographic data, we extracted information about response length, use of hedges, tag questions and imperatives, use of personal language, use of expletives and derogatory language, use of apologetic language, and the types of responses provided. We then analyzed whether certain demographic and socioeconomic factors were statistical predictors of language use in wildland firefighter survey responses with the goal of ultimately providing a framework for differentiating and identifying factors that may influence employee retention, attitudes, morale, and experiences among wildland firefighter sub-demographics. We found that different demographic groups varied in their responses to questions: Minority groups used fewer words and were more likely to relate personal experiences than majority groups.
Objectives:
The increase in global wildland fire activity has accelerated the urgency to understand health risks associated with wildland fire suppression. The aim of this project was to identify occupational health research priorities for wildland firefighters and related personnel.
Design:
In order to identify, rank and rate health research priorities, we followed a modified Delphi approach. Data collection involved a two-stage online survey followed by semi-structured interviews.
Setting:
British Columbia, Canada.
Participants:
Participants included any current or past wildland firefighter or individuals engaged in related roles. There were 132 respondents to the first survey. Responses to the first survey were analysed to produce 10 research topics which were ranked by 75 participants in the second survey (response rate: 84%).
Primary and secondary outcome measures:
The primary outcome was the identification, ranking and level of agreement of research priorities through a two-round online survey. We contextualised these findings through deductive and inductive qualitative content analysis of semi-structured interviews.
Results:
The most important research priorities identified were (% consensus): effects of smoke inhalation on respiratory health (89%), fatigue and sleep (80%), mental health (78%), stress (76%) and long-term risk of disease (67%). Interviews were completed with 14 individuals. Two main themes were developed from an inductive content analysis of interview transcripts: (1) understanding the dynamic risk environment; and (2) organisational fit of mitigation strategies.
Conclusions:
Participants expressed a general concern with the unknown mental and physical health impacts of their jobs, including the long-term risk of morbidity and mortality. Future research must address knowledge gaps in our understanding of the health impacts of wildland fire and work to develop appropriate mitigation strategies while considering the needs of workers and unpredictable workplace environment.
Trial registration number:
Open Science Framework, https://osf.io/ugz4s/.
Objectives
Due to accelerating wildland fire activity, there is mounting urgency to understand, prevent, and mitigate the occupational health impacts associated with wildland fire suppression. The objectives of this review of academic and grey literature were to: Identify the impact of occupational exposure to wildland fires on physical, mental, and emotional health; and
Examine the characteristics and effectiveness of prevention, mitigation, or management strategies studied to reduce negative health outcomes associated with occupational exposure to wildland fire.
Methods
Following established scoping review methods, academic literature as well as government and industry reports were identified by searching seven academic databases and through a targeted grey literature search. 4679 articles were screened using pre-determined eligibility criteria. Data on study characteristics, health outcomes assessed, prevention or mitigation strategies studied, and main findings were extracted from each included document. The results of this scoping review are presented using descriptive tables and a narrative summary to organize key findings.
Results
The final sample was comprised of 100 articles: 76 research articles and 24 grey literature reports. Grey literature focused on acute injuries and fatalities. Health outcomes reported in academic studies focused on respiratory health (n = 14), mental health (n = 16), and inflammation and oxidative stress (n = 12). The identified studies evaluated short-term outcomes measuring changes across a single shift or wildland fire season. Most research was conducted with wildland firefighters and excluded personnel such as aviation crews, contract crews, and incident management teams. Five articles reported direct study of mitigation strategies, focusing on the potential usage of masks, advanced hygiene protocols to reduce exposure, fluid intake to manage hydration and core temperature, and glutamine supplementation to reduce fatigue.
Conclusions
While broad in scope, the evidence base linking wildland fire exposure to any one health outcome is limited. The lack of long-term evidence on changes in health status or morbidity is a clear evidence gap and there is a need to prioritize research on the mental and physical health impact of occupational exposure to wildland fire.
Abstract
Introduction: Little is known about the effectiveness of ongoing mental health support in reducing the mental health impacts of a traumatic deployment. Methods: A cohort of firefighters was established among those deployed to a devas- tating wildfire in Alberta, Canada in May 2016. Firefighters completed three ques- tionnaires: at recruitment giving details of exposures, a first follow‐up reporting mental health supports before, during, and after the fire and a second follow‐up, at least 30 months after the fire, with screening questionnaires for anxiety, depression, and post- traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Fire chiefs were interviewed about mental health provisions. The impact of supports on mental ill health was estimated, adjusting for clustering within fire service and potential confounders.
Results: Of 1234 firefighters in the cohort, 840 completed the questionnaire on mental health supports. In total, 78 of 82 fire chiefs were interviewed. Analysis of the impact of supports on mental ill health included 745 firefighters from 67 fire services. Only 45.8% of reports of peer support were concordant between firefighters and fire chiefs. After adjusting for confounding, the odds ratios (OR) for peer support reported by both fire chief and firefighter were depressive disorder: OR = 0.22, 95% confidence interval (CI), 0.08–0.61; anxiety disorder: OR=0.45, 95% CI, 0.24–0.82; PTSD: OR=0.62, 95% CI, 0.37–1.02. Symptoms of anxiety and depression but not PTSD were reduced by re- siliency training before the fire and by support offered within 48h of return from deployment.
Conclusion: The results suggest peer support in firefighters is protective but its availability is poorly recognized. PTSD was somewhat less responsive, perhaps re- flecting the cumulative effects of previous exposures.
KEYWORDS
firefighters, Fort McMurray fire, intervention, mental ill health, peer support, PTSD
The analysis of factor structures is one of the most critical psychometric applications. Frequently, variables (i.e., items or indicators) resulting from questionnaires using ordinal items with 2–7 categories are used. There are plenty of articles that recommend treating ordinal variables in a factor analysis by default as ordinal and not as continuous imposing a multivariate normal distribution assumption. In this article, we exhibit that the reasoning behind such suggestions is flawed. In our view, findings from simulation studies cannot tell about the right modeling strategy of ordinal variables in factor analysis. Moreover, it is argued that ordinal factor models impose a normality assumption for underlying continuous variables, which might also often be incorrect in empirical applications. However, researchers seldom opt for more flexible modeling strategies that involve correctly specified distributions. Finally, the consequences of modeling choices for validity, reliability, measurement invariance, handling of missing data, and the assessment of global model fit are discussed.
Objective—This report presents national estimates of selected fertility measures
for men and women aged 15–44 in the United States in 2011–2015 based on data
from the National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG). Estimates for 2011–2015 are
compared with those for 2006–2010.
Methods—Data were collected through in-person interviews of a nationally
representative sample of the household population aged 15–44 in the United States
from September 2011 through September 2015. The 2011–2015 NSFG sample
comprised 20,621 respondents aged 15–44, including 9,321 men and 11,300 women.
The response rate for the 2011–2015 NSFG was 72.3% for women and 69.6% for
men. Fertility measures in this report include: have ever had a biological child, number
of children born alive, timing of the first child, and birth spacing.
Results—Most estimates of fertility measures for men and women aged 15–44
in 2011–2015 were similar to those reported in 2006–2010. For 2011–2015, 85.0%
of women had given birth and 80.4% of men had fathered a child by ages 40–44. On
average, women had 1.2 biological children and men had fathered 0.9 children. The
mean age at first birth was 23.1 for women and 25.5 for men. Among women, 31.2%
of first births occurred during the teen years and 54.5% occurred during ages 20–29.
Among men, 13.8% of first births occurred during the teen years and 63.1% occurred
during ages 20–29. In 2011–2015, nearly one-third of women aged 15–44 with a birth
had only had one birth at the time of interview, about one-third had a second birth
within 36 months, and one-third had a second birth more than 36 months after their
first birth. Estimates of fertility measures differed by age, marital or cohabiting status,
education, household income relative to the federal poverty level, and Hispanic origin
and race.
Wildland firefighters perform physical work while being subjected to multiple stressors and adverse, volatile working environments for extended periods. Recent research has highlighted sleep as a significant and potentially modifiable factor impacting operational performance. The aim of this review was to (1) examine the existing literature on firefighters' sleep quantity and quality during wildland firefighting operations; (2) synthesise the operational and environmental factors that impact on sleep during wildland firefighting; and (3) assess how sleep impacts aspects of firefighters' health and safety, including mental and physical health, physical task performance, physical activity and cognitive performance. Firefighters' sleep is restricted during wildfire deployments, particularly when shifts have early start times, are of long duration and when sleeping in temporary accommodation. Shortened sleep impairs cognitive but not physical performance under simulated wildfire conditions. The longer-term impacts of sleep restriction on physiological and mental health require further research. Work shifts should be structured, wherever possible, to provide regular and sufficient recovery opportunities (rest during and sleep between shifts), especially in dangerous working environments where fatigue-related errors have severe consequences. Fire agencies should implement strategies to improve and manage firefighters' sleep and reduce any adverse impacts on firefighters' work.
On the Ground
•Because fire activity fluctuates with short- and long-term term weather and climate trends, understanding trends relative to climate forecasts is critical to mitigating the loss of life and property and rapid vegetation state changes.
•Through the analysis of charcoal and trees scars, historical droughts and fire patterns can be quantified retrospectively for hundreds of years. This evidence suggests that generally fire was most frequent during warm-dry periods as opposed to cool-moist periods. However, arid regions may see an increase of fire activity with an increase of moisture due to inherent fuel load limitations.
•Using federal wildfire and weather data from 2002 to 2015 for New Mexico, Nevada, Oklahoma, and Wyoming, we demonstrate that the worst wildfire activity occurred after average or above average precipitation years followed by drought in Oklahoma and Wyoming. Nevada wildfire activity was correlated with precipitation the preceding year, and New Mexico wildfire activity was not correlated with annual precipitation or preceding year precipitation.
•The effects of future drought on fire intensity and severity are projected to be highly variable because they are both a function of fuel load. However, the potential for very large wildfires is predicted to increase; fire weather is expected to create hotter and drier conditions that start earlier and last longer; and the relative changes may be most noticeable in cooler regions that are of higher latitude and elevation.
As with other fields, medical sciences are subject to different sources of bias. While understanding sources of bias is a key element for drawing valid conclusions, bias in health research continues to be a very sensitive issue that can affect the focus and outcome of investigations. Information bias, otherwise known as misclassification, is one of the most common sources of bias that affects the validity of health research. It originates from the approach that is utilized to obtain or confirm study measurements. This paper seeks to raise awareness of information bias in observational and experimental research study designs as well as to enrich discussions concerning bias problems. Specifying the types of bias can be essential to limit its effects and, the use of adjustment methods might serve to improve clinical evaluation and health care practice.
The purpose of this investigation was to characterize the effects of self-selected work activity on energy expenditure, water turnover, and thermal strain during wildland fire suppression. A secondary aim was to contrast current data with data collected 15 years ago using similar methods to determine whether job demands have changed.
Participants (n = 15, 26 ± 3 years, 179 ± 6 cm, 78.3 ± 8.6 kg) were monitored for 3 days for total energy expenditure, water turnover, core and chest skin temperature, physical activity, and heart rate. Participants arrived to the mobile laboratory each morning, submitted a nude weight, ingested a temperature transmitter, provided a urine sample, and were equipped with a physiological and activity monitor. Participants completed live wildland fire suppression during their work shifts.
Mean core temperature was 37.6° ± 0.2°C, mean chest skin temperature was 34.1° ± 1.0°C, mean heart rate was 112 ± 13 beats/min, and the mean physiological strain index score was 3.3 ± 1.0. Wildland firefighters spent 49 ± 8%, 39 ± 6%, and 12 ± 2% in the sedentary, light, and moderate-vigorous intensity categories, respectively. The mean total energy expenditure was 19.1 ± 3.9 MJ/d, similar to 1997 (17.5 ± 6.9 MJ/d). The mean water turnover in 2012 was 9.5 ± 1.7 L/d, which was higher (P < .05) compared with 1997-98 (7.0 ± 1.7 L/d).
Wildland firefighters do not induce consistently high cardiovascular and thermal strain while completing arduous work in a hot environment despite fairly high chest skin temperatures. The total energy expenditure in the current study suggests job demands are similar to those of 15 years ago, while the increased water turnover may reflect a change in drinking habits.
Copyright © 2014 Wilderness Medical Society. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
This study aims to advance our conceptual understanding of selection procedures by exploring the effect of response fidelity (i.e., written constructed response vs. behavioral constructed response) on test performance, validity, and applicant perceptions. Stimulus fidelity (multimedia stimulus) was kept constant. In a field experiment, 208 applicants for entry-level police officer jobs completed a multimedia situational judgment test with written constructed responses and behavioral responses. We hypothesized the behavioral response mode (a) to be a better predictor of police trainee performance one year later, (b) to be less cognitively saturated, (c) to exhibit higher personality (extraversion) saturation, and (d) to be perceived more positively in terms of media richness. Results suggested support for these hypotheses, although most effect sizes were not large. Implications for a building block approach to personnel selection procedures are discussed.
Wildfire disasters are potentially traumatic events which directly and indirectly affect both citizens and first responders. The study of posttraumatic growth is scarcely found in the context of firefighters and only few studies have addressed this construct. In the current study, posttraumatic symptoms and posttraumatic growth were investigated among Israeli firefighters (N = 65), approximately one month after the Carmel Fire Disaster. Eight firefighters (12.3%) were found to be above the cut-off score for probable PTSD, with intrusion symptoms as the most frequent finding compared to avoidance and hyper-arousal symptoms. Posttraumatic growth (PTG) was evident to a small but considerable degree; noticeable changes were found regarding personal strength and appreciation of life. Results also revealed significant linear and quadratic relationships between PTSD and PTG. Results are discussed in light of past research on psychological responses among firefighters and first responders.
Control over dispute system design brings with it responsibilities. Some employers have chosen to use that control solely for the purpose of risk management, to alter the settlement value of a discrimination case and render it impossible for an employee to obtain effective recourse from the public justice system through the imposition of mandatory arbitration. Other employers, admittedly for whom unilateral imposition of binding arbitration is not a legal option, have instead pursued different objectives: improving opportunities for voice and seeking longer term change in conflict management in the workplace. Looking back over a decade after REDRESS was first implemented, while no program perfectly achieves its design, REDRESS has served and continues to serve its greater purpose, to improve the workplace climate. The institutionalization of the program, its voluntary use by employees, and the significant reduction of formal complaints, suggest that employers may achieve efficiencies through a dispute system design that is voluntary and allows employees to pursue their cases to the public justice system.
To examine the literature on employee morale and to construct a model of this area pertaining to nurses. This framework seeks to present morale in a holistic manner, illustrating the causal factors that influence nursing morale, the changes that occur in morale when these input variables are altered, and the consequences to patient care and individual and group nursing practices.
A number of published works on morale, its causal factors and resulting consequences are critiqued. The findings from this literature review are used to develop a framework for nursing morale.
The paper presents a definition of morale and, from the literature review, concludes that previous models on morale are fragmented; only tending to explore the variables that influence the employees' emotional state. Consequently, a framework of nursing morale is constructed in order to illustrate this topic from a holistic point-of-view.
The paper concludes with a number of management and research implications. The management implications consist of a number of useful suggestions for senior nurses to enhance the morale within their units.
This paper fulfils an identified gap in the literature, namely the lack of a holistic model of nursing morale, and offers practical help to senior nurses so that they can initiate processes within their wards that can improve their subordinates' morale.
Over 40 million jobs in the United States - about 1 in 3 - pay low wages ($11.11 per hour or less) and often do not offer employment benefits like health insurance, retirement savings accounts, paid sick days or family leave. These low-wage jobs are replacing jobs that have historically supported a broad middle class. This report provides a clear and sobering picture of the low-wage labor market through analysis of labor market data, including: downward wage trends over time, poor work conditions, largest occupations, and declining mobility. The authors used a social inclusion definition of low-wage work that allows for comparison among jobs in the United States.
Firefighters are exposed continuously to intense stress situations and traumatic incidents, and are at high risk of developing posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Coping mechanisms and behaviors have been examined as factors contributing to PTSD. The strategies that may be used to cope with stress and/or trauma differ between individuals and also between different professions and traumatic events (Nydegger et al., 2011). Although there is a vast literature on stress and coping processes that exists, very few studies investigated the way individual firefighters cope with trauma. Among several questionnaires that have been used to examine the effects of different types of coping mechanisms after traumatic incidents is the Albert Einstein College of Medicine-Coping Style Questionnaire (AECOM-CSQ; Plutchik and Conte, 1989). In August 2007, large areas in the Peloponnese, Greece, were devastated by wildfires. One month after the event, experienced researchers visited the affected area to provide psychological support and to investigate the psychosocial consequences among the local professional firefighters. One hundred two firefighters that were on duty for the entire period of firefighting (several days) were interviewed using several questionnaires, among them the AECOM-CSQ. Our hypothesis was that firefighters who presented with PTSD would be more inclined toward engaging in avoidance coping mechanisms. A total of 18.6% of the firefighters were found to have PTSD according to ICD-10 criteria. Logistic regression showed that firefighters using the coping mechanisms of minimization and blame were associated with the greater likelihood of PTSD. It seems that specific coping mechanisms used by firefighters immediately after the traumatic event might contribute to the development of PTSD.
Introduction:
Workplace sexual violence is not a new phenomenon but has received increased attention recently with the re-emergence of the #metoo movement. Gaps exist in the understanding of the prevalence of this problem in the U.S., its perpetrators, and its impacts.
Methods:
Using 2010-2012 data from the National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey (22,590 women and 18,584 men), this study examined the prevalence of several types of sexual violence by a workplace-related perpetrator (authority figure or nonauthority figure) and numerous impacts of the violence, including psychological impacts, safety concerns, and missing days of work or school. Data were analyzed in 2018.
Results:
In the U.S., 5.6% of women (almost 7 million) and 2.5% of men (nearly 3 million) reported some type of sexual violence by a workplace-related perpetrator. Almost 4% of women (3.9%) reported sexual violence by nonauthority figures and 2.1% reported authority figures; 2.0% of men reported sexual violence by nonauthority figures, and 0.6% reported authority figures. For women, the most commonly reported sexual violence type was unwanted sexual contact (3.5% of women); for men, it was noncontact unwanted sexual experiences (1.3% of men). An estimated 1 million women (0.8%) have been raped by a workplace-related perpetrator. For women and men, fear was the most commonly reported impact of workplace-related sexual violence.
Conclusions:
These findings suggest that workplace prevention efforts that do not address different components of workplace harassment may not be adequate to address all forms of sexual violence occurring across the U.S. in the workplace context.
Wildland firefighters working in remote environments with steep terrain, uneven ground, variable temperatures and fluctuating elevations cultivate injury risk. The purpose of this study was to understand types of injuries and illnesses wildland firefighters (WLFFs) sustain during the fire season. This study was a web-based cross-sectional questionnaire titled Injury surveillance of wildland firefighters. A total of 284 WLFFs responded to the questionnaire, but were not required to answer every question. Quantitative data from the questionnaire were analysed to determine WLFF demographics, types of injuries and illnesses sustained, and the potential influence environmental factors have on injuries sustained. Most WLFFs sustained at least one injury or illness in the past five fire seasons with a majority of those injuries and illnesses occurring on the fireline on rocky mountainside terrain. Nearly half of the 453 injuries and illnesses reported were sprains and strains occurring to the lower back, knee and ankle. Twenty percent of WLFFs reporting injuries felt that their injury or illness was preventable. With most injuries and illnesses occurring on the fireline, the development of a more targeted, job-specific injury and illness prevention program that focuses on the lower extremities is warranted.
Recent research has indicated that firefighters are at elevated suicide risk. Fire service organizations have called for research to examine fire service subgroups that might be at relatively increased suicide risk. Although anecdotal reports suggest that wildland firefighters represent one such group, to our knowledge, no study has empirically examined this conjecture. Thus, the present investigation examined if wildland firefighters report greater levels of suicide risk than non-wildland firefighters. Moreover, we sought to determine if two constructs proposed by the interpersonal theory of suicide to comprise suicidal desire—thwarted belongingness and perceived burdensomeness—statistically explain the link between wildland firefighter status and suicide risk. Merged data from two nationwide investigations of firefighter mental health were utilized (N=1,131; 68.2% male, 89.4% White). A total of 1.8% (n=20) of the sample identified as wildland firefighters. Compared to non-wildland firefighters, wildland firefighters reported greater levels of suicide risk. Thwarted belongingness, but not perceived burdensomeness, statistically explained this link. Findings suggest that programs enhancing social connectedness within the fire service, particularly among wildland firefighters, might be one avenue for suicide prevention among firefighters. Results of this novel investigation should be interpreted in light of the relatively small subgroup of wildland firefighters.
Background: Firefighters participate in activities with intense physical and psychological stress and are constantly at risk to develop various psychopathological reactions.
Aims: To investigate psychological reactions in firefighters one month after devastating wildfires in Greece, during August 2007, which lead to the devastation of large areas and the death of 43 people among whom three were firefighters.
Methods: One month after the wildfires, a joint task force of mental health clinicians was organized in order to provide psychological support and to investigate the psychological consequences of wildfires to firefighters. One hundred and two firefighters, living within the fire-devastated area, who were on duty for the whole period of wildfires were interviewed and assessed with the use of several questionnaires and inventories.
Results: Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) was detected in 18.6% of firefighters. Multiple logistic regression found that existence of fear of dying during firefighting, insomnia and increased scores in neuroticism, as well as in depression subscale of the SCL-90, were significantly associated with greater likelihood for having PTSD. Additionally those firefighters who worked permanently had 70% lower probability of having PTSD vs. those seasonally employed.
Conclusions: Insomnia, depressive symptoms, as well as personality characteristics as neuroticism and the perception of fear of imminent death during firefighting operations may precipitate the development of PTSD in firefighters. Within this context, mental health clinicians should be aware that the early detection of these predisposing factors may facilitate the prevention and mitigation of PTSD in firefighters particularly those who are seasonally employed.
Background:
Little is known regarding the impact of long-term wildland firefighting on health. Our objective was to investigate associations between duration of wildland firefighting experience and the prevalence of self-reported health outcomes.
Methods:
We ascertained employment, health, and demographic information on 499 current wildland firefighters (WLFFs) via questionnaire.
Results:
Relative to those with less than 10 years of experience as a WLFF, those with 10-19 years of experience had significantly greater odds of having ever been diagnosed with hypertension, as did those with 20 or more years of experience. Significant associations were observed for report of physician-diagnosed heart arrhythmia and previous knee surgery.
Conclusions:
We observed significant links between a greater number of years as a WLFF and self-report of two subclinical cardiovascular risk factors as well as markers of musculoskeletal health. Additional studies are needed to determine if findings can be generalized to all WLFFs. Am. J. Ind. Med. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Organizations depend heavily upon employees’ willingness to make an extra effort. As such, employee commitment is very important to the effective operation of any organization. We argue that the previous concept of organizational commitment may not capture some important aspects of the organizational commitment construct. We identify three dimensions of commitment: commitments to the supervisor, the work group, and the organization. We examine differences in the foci of commitment comparing the organizational commitment configuration of a sample of paid and volunteer firefighters in Northern New York. All firefighters perform the same work and must meet the same job requirements so we anticipate any differences in the configuration of the organizational commitment construct to be a function of whether they are getting paid or not. We found significant differences between the two groups of firefighters in the foci of their commitment: paid firefighters are higher on their commitment to their supervisor, while volunteers were higher on commitment to the organization. We argue that conceiving organizational commitment as multi-focused construct offers more useful information to researchers and managers.
This paper discusses briefly some of the theories concerning the structure of morale and, in particular, reports the results of three separate research investigations. The investigations aim at defining the broad social sentiments shared by the general population of industrial employees which are the basic dimensions of the work environment. The same five dimensions or factors were identified in each of the three investigations. The consistency of these results as well as their congruence with those obtained by others suggests that five of the basic factors in the structure of morale have been identified.
Research has shown that hostile environments can be a particular problem for women working in traditional male jobs such as policing and defence forces or where they are employed on remote work sites with residential arrangements. These ‘masculinity’ marked workplaces have a high incidence of sexual harassment. Australia's rural region has an ethos of male dominance. The increased exodus of young women from rural communities could intensify the ‘masculine’ culture that saturates rural areas. Given these factors, plus an expected prevalence of occupations with token female representation, we expected to find pervasive sexual harassment as evidenced by both group or pack sexual harassment and the normalisation of a variety of sexual harassment manifestations. To test this hypothesis and to find out more about the nature of sexual harassment in remote Australia, a sample of women employees and employers from 101 workplaces in different parts of remote and regional Australia were interviewed. We found that many of the respondents experienced or observed both ‘one-on-one’ harassment and ‘pack-on-one’ harassment. These behaviours were more common in the traditionally defined masculine occupations like agriculture/horticulture and mining. We did not find a positive correlation between remoteness and sexual harassment with respondents from the most remote areas tending to be from professional occupations.
This article describes the practice of organizational self-study and examines its potential to create “discursive openings” in systematically distorted communication, particularly when members engage new discourses to investigate subjective and objective features of their own organizational lives. It investigates a recent self-study undertaken by the U.S. Forest Service to diagnose and solve safety issues in wildland firefighting. The analysis reveals how engaging a new discourse allowed firefighters to imagine a new culture where they would be encouraged to think rather than just obey rules. But certain discursive closure moves reinforced the constitutive steering medium of bureaucratically managed safety rules, and potentially thwarted cultural change hoped for by organizational members and demanded by legitimating third parties.
Background:
Wildland fires cost billions of dollars annually and expose thousands of firefighters to a variety of occupational hazards. Little is known about injury patterns among wildland firefighters.
Methods:
We examined non-fatal firefighter injuries among federal wildland firefighters reported to the US Department of the Interior for the years 2003-2007. The risk of disabling injury by job assignment, controlling for demographic and temporal variables, was assessed with logistic regression.
Results:
Of the 1301 non-fatal injuries, slips, trips, and falls were the most frequent injury types and sprains/strains were the most common injury. Engine crew workers suffered a third of all injuries. Handcrews and helitak/smokejumper assignments had increased odds of sprains and strains, which were the most common injury overall.
Conclusions:
While some injuries are equally prevalent by job assignment, others vary. Identifying hazards leading to these injuries will be essential to develop prevention strategies.
Many debates surround systems for resolving workplace disputes. In the United States, traditional unionized grievance procedures, emerging nonunion dispute resolution systems, and the court-based system for resolving employment law disputes have all been criticized. What is missing from these debates are rich metrics beyond speed and satisfaction for comparing and evaluating dispute resolution systems. In this paper, we develop efficiency, equity, and voice as these standards. Unionized, nonunion, and employment law procedures are then qualitatively evaluated against these three metrics.
Disease burden estimates rarely consider comorbidity. Using a recently developed methodology for integrating information about comorbidity into disease burden estimates, we examined the comparative burdens of nine mental and 10 chronic physical disorders in the National Comorbidity Survey Replication (NCS-R).
Face-to-face interviews in a national household sample (n = 5,692) assessed associations of disorders with scores on a visual analog scale (VAS) of perceived health. Multiple regression analysis with interactions for comorbidity was used to estimate these associations. Simulation was used to estimate incremental disorder-specific effects adjusting for comorbidity.
The majority of respondents (74.9%) reported one or more disorders. Of respondents with disorders, 73.8-98.2% reported having at least one other disorder. The best-fitting model to predict VAS scores included disorder main effects and interactions for number of disorders. Adjustment for comorbidity reduced individual-level disorder-specific burden estimates substantially, but with considerable between-disorder variation (0.07-0.69 ratios of disorder-specific estimates with and without adjustment for comorbidity). Four of the five most burdensome disorders at the individual level were mental disorders based on bivariate analyses (panic/agoraphobia, bipolar disorder, posttraumatic stress disorder, major depression) but only two based on multivariate analyses, adjusting for comorbidity (panic/agoraphobia, major depression). Neurological disorders, chronic pain conditions, and diabetes were the other most burdensome individual-level disorders. Chronic pain conditions, cardiovascular disorders, arthritis, insomnia, and major depression were the most burdensome societal-level disorders.
Adjustments for comorbidity substantially influence estimates of disease burden, especially those of mental disorders, underlining the importance of including information about comorbidity in studies of mental disorders.
To curtail the spread of wildfire, firefighters are often required to work long hours in hot, smoky conditions with little rest between consecutive shifts. In isolation, heat, smoke, and sleep disruption can have a detrimental impact on cognitive and physical abilities. Far less is known, however, about the combined impact that heat, smoke, and sleep disruption can have on firefighters' performance during wildfire suppression or on human performance in general. The available literature, though scant, suggests that audio and visual tracking may be degraded after sustained heat exposure following one night of sleep deprivation. Exposure to heat and carbon monoxide, in contrast, appears to have only limited impact on cognitive performance, even after physical exercise. Heat and carbon monoxide exposure does, however, increase physiological exertion to a given work or exercise bout. To the authors' knowledge, there are no published studies that have explored the impacts of heat exposure following sleep disruption on physical work performance, sleep disruption and smoke exposure on physical or cognitive work, or the combined impacts of sleep disruption, smoke and heat exposure on cognitive or physical work. While more integrative research is needed, the current review provides a summary of the available evidence and an indication of the degree of confidence agencies can have in the research. This will allow both the scientific community and agencies to make informed recommendations regarding the management of wildland firefighters' health and safety on the fireground.
The prevalence and longitudinal course of post-traumatic stress disorder were studied in a group of 459 firefighters who were exposed to the Ash Wednesday bushfires in South Australia. The main finding, that the level of morbidity four months after the disaster remained almost unchanged at 29 months, indicates the long-term nature of post-traumatic stress disorder. Twenty-nine months after the fire, 21% of the firefighters were continuing to experience imagery of the disaster, in a way that interfered with their lives. The failure of present disaster management plans to recognize the psychological impact of natural disasters and the long-term nature of post-traumatic stress disorder is emphasized, and the need for preventive mental health programmes to minimize such morbidity in the future is discussed.
National surveys of older Americans routinely have included functional limitation items using either a leading approach ("how much difficulty do you have...") or a neutral approach ("do you have any difficulty..."). This article evaluates the performance of scales based on these two approaches. Methods: Using responses from 595 randomly selected participants to the 1994 Health and Retirement Study, the authors compared prevalences and evaluated scales based on each approach with respect to the extent of missing data, face validity, reliability, predictive validity, convergent validity, and robustness of odds ratios in predictive models. Results: The authors found that leading questions provided higher estimates of functional limitations than neutral questions, but both approaches yielded scales with similar validity and reliability. However, for both approaches, scales incorporating degree of difficulty had better validity and reliability than those based on counts of tasks. All four approaches yielded substantially similar coefficients in a model predicting disability onset. Discussion: The authors conclude that, because they minimize survey time without compromising validity and reliability, items that explicitly capture degree of difficulty by asking "How much difficulty do you have..." may be the optimal approach for survey designers.
The National Comorbidity Survey Replication (NCS-R) is a new nationally representative community household survey of the prevalence and correlates of mental disorders in the US. The NCS-R was carried out a decade after the original NCS. The NCS-R repeats many of the questions from the NCS and also expands the NCS questioning to include assessments based on the more recent Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV) diagnostics system (American Psychiatric Association, 1994). The NCS-R was designed to (1) investigate time trends and their correlates over the decade of the 1990s and (2) expand the assessment of the prevalence and correlates of mental disorders beyond the assessment in the baseline NCS in order to address a number of important substantive and methodological issues that were raised by the NCS. This paper presents a brief review of these aims.
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