Fire Officers Research Articles

A Study on the Effects of Job Environments on Psychological Burnout among Fire Officers

A Study on the Effects of Job Environments on Psychological Burnout among Fire Officers

Confined Space Emergency Response: Assessing Employer and Fire Department Practices

An emergency response plan for industrial permit-required confined space entry is essential for employee safety and is legally required. Maintaining a trained confined space rescue team, however, is costly and technically challenging. Some employers turn to public fire departments to meet their emergency response requirements. The confined space emergency response practices of employers and fire departments have not been previously assessed. We present (1) federal data on the U.S. occurrence between 1992 and 2005 of confined space fatal incidents involving toxic and/or oxygen-deficient atmospheres; (2) survey data from 21 large companies on permit-required confined space emergency response practices; (3) data on fire department arrival times; and (4) estimates by 10 senior fire officers of fire department rescue times for confined space incidents. Between 1992 and 2005, 431 confined space incidents that met the case definition claimed 530 lives, or about 0.63% of the 84,446 all-cause U.S. occupational fatal injuries that occurred during this period. Eighty-seven (20%) incidents resulted in multiple fatalities. Twelve (57%) of 21 surveyed companies reported that they relied on the fire department for permit-required confined space emergency response. Median fire department arrival times were about 5 min for engines and 7 min for technical rescue units. Fire department confined space rescue time estimates ranged from 48 to 123 min and increased to 70 and 173 min when hazardous materials were present. The study illustrates that (1) confined space incidents represent a small but continuing source of fatal occupational injuries in the United States; (2) a sizeable portion of employers may be relying on public fire departments for permit-required confined space emergency response; and (3) in the event of a life-threatening emergency, fire departments usually are not able to effect a confined space rescue in a timely manner. We propose that the appropriate role for the fire department is to support a properly trained and equipped on-site rescue team and to provide advanced life support intervention following extrication and during ambulance transportation.

A Study on the Determinants Variables of Career Commitment to the Police Officers and Fire Officers

A Study on the Determinants Variables of Career Commitment to the Police Officers and Fire Officers

A Method for Estimating the Efficiency of Commanding in the State Fire Service of Poland

A rough method for estimating commanding efficiency of Fire&Rescue officers is presented in the article. The idea is to evaluate the officers in charge and their actions based on the information collected in the incident data reporting system. The criteria for the commanding evaluation is the distribution of durations of the actions conducted by consecutive commanders.

(A47) Pediatric Mass-Casualty Triage: The New York City Approach

IntroductionA Mass-Casualty Event (MCE) involving pediatric victims could overwhelm existing pediatric resources. Therefore, early recognition of critically ill infants and children is essential for proper distribution among pediatric capable hospitals. However, emergency medical services (EMS) personnel have limited experience with pediatric assessments, and less with pediatric mass-casualty triage (MCT). To address these gaps, the New York City (NYC) Pediatric Disaster Coalition (PDC) in collaboration with the Fire Department (FDNY) and Office of Emergency Management, made simple alterations to the START-based NYC-MCT Algorithm that can be rapidly and accurately applied by EMS personnel in the field with minimal additional education and preparation, obviating the requirement for extensive and expensive retraining.MethodsThe PDC includes experts in pediatric emergency preparedness, emergency medicine, critical care, and trauma surgery in NYC, as well as DOHMH, FDNY-OMA, and OEM. Its Triage Subcommittee determined the minimum essential pediatric alterations to the Algorithm, which then was tested by FDNY-EMS.ResultsAfter focused literature review and multiple draft revisions aimed to maximize pediatric benefit yet minimize unnecessary complexity, the Algorithm was modified to ensure that: (1) five rescue breaths will be provided to infants or children prior to being categorized as Dead or Expectant; (2) infants under 12 months old will be categorized as Critical and receive priority transport, and (3) children initially categorized as Delayed or Minor will be uptriaged to a new Urgent (Orange) category to receive such care in a rapid manner. To date, > 3,000 FDNY personnel have been trained in its use, and tested its accuracy using tabletop scenarios. Mean accuracy is 80–90%.ConclusionsThe model is an effective, multidisciplinary approach to planning. Minimum alterations to the Algorithm were adopted by the regional EMS system. The Modified Algorithm improves identification of critically ill infants and children. This approach could be adopted by other large urban centers.

New Venues for Discovering Fire and Emergency Services Literature

This paper looks at a project that served to make Executive Fire Officer Applied Research Project papers as well as fire and emergency services-related periodical literature discoverable in the WorldCat search engine, the world’s largest database of library materials. It examines why these resources are important to the fire community and explains the desirability of making them more readily visible to a wider audience. Integrating citations to the EFOP papers and periodical literature into WorldCat also led to other new developments at the US Fire Administration’s library such as the implementation of the WorldCat Local search which affords users a wide variety of highly important research tools and enhancements including a more seamless and immediate means to search across the fire and emergency services domain of periodical literature and more.

A response to ‘Fighting the fire’: fire chiefs’ proposal to run England’s ambulance service

In October 2010, JPP published a comment by Prof Malcolm Woollard, titled ‘Fighting the fire: a response to fire chiefs’ proposal to run England’s ambulance service’, expressing his view as to why the proposal by the Chief Fire Officers Association (CFOA) is not workable. JPP has received a letter regarding this, which is printed below, along with a response from Prof Woollard that also discusses the latest report published by the CFOA.

Letters to the Editor

Journal of Paramedic PracticeVol. 3, No. 2 Letters to the EditorLetters to the EditorMalcolm WoollardMalcolm WoollardSearch for more papers by this authorMalcolm WoollardPublished Online:16 Aug 2013https://doi.org/10.12968/jpar.2011.3.2.62aAboutSectionsView articleView Full TextPDF/EPUB ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack CitationsPermissions ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InEmail View article References Chief Fire Officers Association (2010) Fire Futures. Role of the Fire and Rescue Service (Delivery Models) Report. http://tinyurl.com/6gaaqn5 (accessed 11 January 2011) Google ScholarWoollard M (2010) Fighting the fire: a response to the Chief Fire Officer’s proposal to run England’s ambulance service. JPP 2(10): 450–54 Google Scholar FiguresReferencesRelatedDetails 4 February 2011Volume 3Issue 2ISSN (print): 1759-1376ISSN (online): 2041-9457 Metrics History Published online 16 August 2013 Published in print 4 February 2011 Information© MA Healthcare LimitedPDF download

No smoke without fire

On Thursday 30th September 2010 on BBC Radio 4's ‘You and Yours’ show, Peter Holland, President of the Chief Fire Officers Association, put forward a proposal for the fire service to take over and run the emergency side of the ambulance service (BBC Radio 4, 2010). His suggestion was that it would save money, provide a better service and improve response times-but at a time when the coalition is set to announce significant cuts in funding of some government departments, is the proposal more about saving fire service jobs than improving performance?

Fighting the fire: a response to fire chiefs' proposal to run England's ambulance service

The fire and rescue service in England has proposed taking over and running the ambulance service. This has obviously sparked a great debate among both the ambulance and fire service industry. According to the Chief Fire Officers Association (CFOA), the ambulance service is struggling to meet its response targets of dealing with 75% of life-threatening calls within eight minutes, and believes the fire service could respond to life-threatening calls within eight minutes 90% of the time. This proposal is detailed below, followed by a commentary by Professor Malcolm Woollard, Honorary Consultant Paramedic and Director of the Pre-hospital, Emergency and Cardiovascular Care Applied Research Group at Coventry University, who argues why this idea is not workable.

Who’s Going to Pick Up the Trash? Using the Build America Bond Program to Help State and Local Governments’ Cash Deficits

All over the United States, state and local governments are facing increasing revenue deficits due to the current economic recession. Even during good economic times, state and local governments experience temporary cash-flow deficits. State and local governments use short-term municipal bond debt to finance temporary cash-flow deficits caused by the normal erratic collection of tax revenue. The issuance of short-term debt secured by future tax revenue has always been a financing tool that helped local governments with cash-flow problems. The effects of the subprime mortgage crisis and the current recession threaten state and local governments’ ability to use this financial tool. The increased cost of issuing short-term debt, coupled with the general reduction of tax revenue collected due to the current recession, has restricted state and local governments’ ability to issue short-term debt. Without the use of affordable short-term debt, state and local governments are faced with severe cash-flow problems that threaten their ability to pay for services for their citizens. For example, local governments may be faced with the decision to layoff public safety workers such as fire fighters and police officers, reducing library and recreational park hours, or, in some cases, reducing trash pickup within their communities. To reduce the borrowing costs for state and local government issuers of short-term municipal bonds that are used to finance cash-flow deficits, this article proposes to utilize a federal subsidized taxable bond program similar to the Build America Bond program.

Increasing Spatial Awareness by Integrating Internet Geographic Information Services (GIServices) with Real Time Wireless Mobile GIS Applications

Spatial awareness is one of the fundamental decision making capabilities for human beings. Two key information technologies, Internet Geographic Information Services (GIServices) and wireless mobile Geographic Information Systems (GIS) can enhance the spatial awareness of decision makers and facilitate more efficient and comprehensive decision making processes. Internet GIServices provide a collaborative communication environment for sharing data, information and knowledge among multiple decision makers and stakeholders. Wireless mobile GIS combines both geospatial information and Global Positional Systems (GPS) coordinates from remotely located field-based personnel to spatial decision support systems (SDSS). By adopting broadband wireless telecommunication technology for connecting Internet GIServices and mobile GIS devices, decision makers can gather near real time information from field personnel and equally quickly distribute updated information back to the field. Communicated via wireless devices and web applications, interactive and dynamic geographic information services will enhance spatial awareness of decision makers, field personnel (such as fire fighters and police officers), and the general public.

Emergency planning: major incidents and command training

Major, complex, multi-casualty incidents occur with surprising regularity and previously, the command of these from a health perspective was often delegated to those with the most experience. Time served in the ambulance service was often the measure of one's ability to take command of such an event. The police and fire and rescue services have long established training programmes for their commanders. This training is in addition to their normal day job and is specific to incident command. Police and fire officers can only perform in that role if they have successfully completed the training required. The same cannot be said of health incident commanders.

Children's village: an innovative approach to community safety

In 1986 fire and police officers in Western Maryland, USA recognised the need to create a centralised life safety education centre for children. A number of events precipitated the development...

Characteristics and triage of a maritime disaster: an accidental passenger ship collision in Korea

The aim of this study was to analyze the characteristics of and responses to a maritime disaster, by reviewing the events surrounding the accidental collision of a high-speed passenger ship in South Korea. Of the 215 boarded passengers on a high-speed passenger ship sailing from Fukuoka to Busan, we retrospectively examined information of 114 victims of the ship's collision with a whale on 12 April 2007. We referenced reports from the on-site disaster medical assistance team members; recorded notifications to the Busan 1339 Emergency Medical Information Centre, from the scene of the accident and data from the ship's insurer. The 114 victims were transported to 20 different hospitals. Many patients were transported to nearby local hospitals from the scene of the accident; other patients were transported to more distant hospitals. Eighty-five patients were transported to hospitals through mobile emergency support units, whereas the other patients were transported directly by fire officers from the 119 Fire Officer Centre. One patient died in the transport. In conclusion, our national emergency medical service and disaster response system each suffer from many problems - especially a lack of cooperation among related departments and insufficient communication therein. The onboard planning and practice of a disaster plan is required, and a reliable information system between the scene of a maritime disaster and our emergency medical service system should be developed.

Exposure of emergency medical responders to methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections result in 19,000 deaths a year in the United States. Epidemiologic studies have shown that community-acquired infections are increasing dramatically, and strains typical of community infections are increasingly detected in hospital populations. Emergency medical responders (EMR) are exposed to both community and hospital MRSA patients, which, combined with their communal lifestyles in fire stations, results in higher risk of exposure. This study determined the occurrence and frequency of MRSA and other bacterial indicators on environmental surfaces in fire stations, training sites, and offices of EMR. Handled sponges were used for collection of targeted bacteria from commonly contacted environmental surfaces at EMR facilities. Biochemical tests confirmed isolates as S aureus, and MRSA was confirmed by growth on selective and differential media. An initial set of 500 samples was collected at 9 fire-related facilities to identify areas of increased exposure. Subsequent studies targeted sites (n = 160) for repeat sampling that were MRSA positive. S aureus was isolated from 10.6% (17/160) of the sampled sites. The couch and the classroom desks were the most contaminated at 20% (4/20 and 2/10, respectively). Of the S aureus isolated, 64.7% (11/17) were confirmed as MRSA. EMR have a high potential for exposure to MRSA, not only through patient and hospital contacts but also in the fire station environment. MRSA was isolated with the highest frequency on the couches and the class desks. Although the true health significance of these exposures is unknown, improved infection control practices, such as routine handwashing and surface disinfection, are warranted to reduce MRSA exposures.

소방공무원의 스트레스 요인과 직무만족간의 관계

그동안 공무원의 스트레스 요인과 직무만족에 대한 연구는 대부분이 역할 관계와 인간 관계에 따른 스트레스 증가로 인한 직무만족의 저하에 대한 연구가 대부분을 이루고 있었다. 그러나 소방공무원의 경우, 직무상 위험성, 긴급성, 대기성, 교대성의 특징을 지니고 있기 때문에 직무 특성에 따른 스트레스가 다소 발생할 것으로 사료된다. 따라서 본 연구는 소방공무원의 스트레스 요인을 직무특성(위험성, 긴급성, 대기성, 교대성)요인과 조직내역할(역할갈등, 역할모호, 역할과다)요인으로 구분하여 각각 직무만족에 어떠한 영향력을 미치는지를 실증 분석 하였다. 결과적으로 소방공무원의 직무특성 요인과 조직내역할 요인은 직무만족에 유의미한 영향력을 미치고 있었고, 구체적으로 직무특성 요인 중에서는 긴급성과 대기성이 직무만족에 정(+)의 영향력을 미치고 있었고, 조직내역할 요인 중에서는 역할 갈등과 역할 과다가 직무만족에 부(-)의 영향력을 미치고 있는 것으로 결과가 나타났다. 또한 업무형태(화재 진압, 구조 구급, 소방 행정, 기타)에 따라 스트레스 요인 및 직무만족에 유의미한 차이를 보이고 있었고, 근무기간(소방본부, 소방서, 119안전센터)에 따라서도 스트레스 요인 및 직무만족에 유의미한 차이를 보이고 있었다. Most of previous studies on civil servants' stress factors and job satisfaction have been focused on low job satisfaction caused by stress from role relations and human relations. In case of fire officers, however, their stress is expected to be influenced by their unique job characteristics such as risk, urgency, stand-by, and shift. Thus, this study divided fire officers'stress factors into job-related factors (risk, urgency, stand-by, alternation) and role-related factors (role conflict, role ambiguity, role overload), and empirically analyzed how these factors affect their job satisfaction. According to the results of this study, fire officers' job characteristics and their roles in the organization had a significant effect on their job satisfaction. Particularly, among the job-related factors, urgency and stand-by had a positive effect on job satisfaction, and among role-related factors, role conflict and role overload had a negative effect on job satisfaction. In addition, fire officers' stress and job satisfaction were significantly different according to their job (fire fighting, rescue and first aid, fire administration, others), and according to their workplace (fire fighting headquarters, fire station, 119 safety center).

Medical and prehospital care training in UK fire and rescue services

Background:Fire fighters are often in a position to provide immediate medical assistance to casualties at the incidents they attend. Fire service national standards require competence in casualty stabilisation but the...

Social problems in disaster victim identification following the 2006 Pangandaran tsunami

Disasters, both natural and man-made, are inevitable. Interpol and the ICRC have produced Disaster Victim Identification (DVI) Guidelines to assist examiners in the identification of disaster victims. Nevertheless, problems remain in DVI practice, as was evident following the 2006 tsunami in Pangandaran, a popular tourist destination in West Java, Indonesia. The problems included the desire of families to bury their relatives quickly, the decomposed condition of the dead bodies, the inadequate security which hampered the identification process, the shortage of space to conduct identification, and the lack of understanding by local police and the community. Despite these challenges, simplified identification did take place. Due to these challenges, however, academics and the government have begun workshops for both professionals and non-professionals in an attempt to introduce DVI to society. These workshops have been attended by government officers, members of the public, religious figures, military personnel, fire department employees, SAR, journalists, NGOs, and regional police officers. It is anticipated that these individuals will convey the importance of DVI practice to others within their professions and communities. We propose that future identification processes be streamlined, so that they are both quicker and more efficient. This would minimise the problems experienced in DVI, particularly when there are a large number of victims.

Personal features of cadets State University of Fire Service of EMERCOM of Russia and their correspondence with Fire officer’s employee

Personal features of cadets State University of Fire Service of EMERCOM of Russia and their correspondence with Fire officer’s employee