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Saving lives has a price for emergency responders

Posted February 19, 2016 10:00 pm

By Pete Spitler Staff Writer

Once associated mainly with battlefield veterans, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is now being diagnosed in those who witness many traumatic experiences - including first responders.

According to the American Psychological Association, 43 percent of adults suffer from stress-related health effects, but the men and women of the emergency service profession are at greater risk for long-term stress that could lead to PTSD.

"Everything we do, unfortunately bad things happen," said Chester Fire Chief Marty Bert. "That's what we're trained for. If you're a firefighter/paramedic in St. Louis, you're dealing with fires and auto extrications perhaps every day.

"The problem around here is we're going to know most of the people we take out (of car accidents)."

Bert and his department were called out for a two-car accident on Route 3 next to Red Dot Construction on Jan. 28 that fatally injured 89-year-old Imogene Gordon of Chester.

Gordon was a regular customer of Bert's Auto Services, which is owned by the fire chief.

"From my perspective, you just put that in your back of the mind and go past it," Bert said. "You can't focus on that or you can't get the job done."

A 'humanistic' approach to training

The National Fire Protection Association estimated that in 2013, the latest statistics were available, there were 1,140,750 local firefighters in the U.S.

Sixty-nine percent of those were volunteer and most of those (95 percent) were in departments that protected less than 25,000 people.

A 1995 Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) study, the most recent such study found, noted that most volunteer fire departments were in rural communities and as a result, "emergency workers frequently know the victims and/or their families, thus compounding their levels of stress and emotional trauma."

Research has shown stress to be the leading cause of attrition in volunteer fire departments and can lead to emotional and behavioral problems - including depression, alcoholism, substance abuse and even suicide.

Various university studies and analysis have called for more "humanistic" approaches to training emergency personnel - with first responders learning about the stages of grief, what to expect from a suddenly bereaved family and how to more helpfully interact with family members.

"We don't take any (grief) training," Bert said. "We take our firefighting training and that's it. We're mostly trained for fire fighting and auto extrication."

Steeleville Fire Chief Carlos Barbour, who is also a member of the Village Board, said grief services are offered to village personnel, but it's rarely used.

"We do offer it to everybody who works for the Village," Barbour said. "It's available as a group and as an individual, if they desire. We offer it in both aspects, but we haven't had to use it."

The SAMHSA study also noted that since rural fire departments tend to respond to far fewer calls for service than professional (full-time) departments, those firefighters may not be as emotionally desensitized to certain types of incidents.

"If somebody knows the person, we keep them back," Bert said. "If you're afraid of heights, we don't put you on ladders.

"There's guys who can handle the auto extrication and the blood and that's who we send up there."

Andy Gerlach, also a Village of Steeleville board member and a member of the city's fire department since 1999, told the Herald Tribune of the night he drove the SFD's rescue truck to a car accident in July 2013 that involved his sister, Melissa Sauerwein.

"I drove the rescue truck out to the scene not knowing who it was and it turned out to be my sister who died," Gerlach said. "She was fatally injured and passed away that night.

"Even in a small community like Steeleville, that happens. It happened a mile away from her home. You could see the flashing lights from her house to where it happened."

The Percy Fire Department had one of the most traumatic calls in recent memory, when it was paged out to the report of a house fire on May 10, 2013.

Four children - 12-year-old Ethan Owen, 9-year-old Kailey Owen and 5-year-old twins Brandan and Landan Owen - perished in the arson fire set by Derrick Twardoski.

Twardoski was sentenced to 53 years in prison in October 2014 in a plea deal that saw four counts of first-degree murder reduced to one.

"We've had a couple of what we call 'bad calls' with the propane truck incident and the Owen fire," said Percy Fire Chief Dale Fisk, referring to a March 2013 two-vehicle fatal accident on County Line Road in which a semitrailer hauling propane rear-ended a coal truck and caught fire. "At the propane incident, it was very unfortunate that the driver lost his life.

"That really didn't bother me as much as what happened when the (propane) truck blew up."

Fifty-five-year-old Mickey E. Clayton, of Franklin, died in the accident. The driver of the coal truck, 48-year-old Randy E. Edwards of Pinckneyville, was not injured.

"Me, and probably about a dozen other firefighters were within 200 feet of (the truck)," Fisk said. "You just get that flood of emotion of 'Oh my God, I nearly killed 14 people trying to put out a stupid truck.'

"It was a realization of how dangerous it is doing what we do."

Police not immune

Police officers aren't immune to PTSD either. A 2006 study, published by the New York Academy of Sciences, noted that incidences of PTSD varied between 7 percent and 19 percent of all current-duty officers.

Many others experienced symptoms, but failed to meet the full diagnostic criteria for PTSD.

"In a small agency like this, we know our community pretty well," said Chester Police Chief Ryan Coffey. "When our officers are exposed to a traumatic event, we want to be sensitive to that and offer (counseling) assistance.

"Years ago, (PTSD) just wasn't something administrators even thought of, but nowadays, we have that knowledge and you can get out in front of the problem by offering the officer assistance."

Coffey noted that the effects of emotional trauma could linger with the officer.

"It doesn't have to be someone that they know," Coffey said. "But if it is somebody that they know, that can affect (the officer) for years to come and can certainly affect their job performance and their success rate in their profession."

Randolph County Sheriff Shannon Wolff told the Herald Tribune his deputies receive training on those who have mental disabilities, but they do not receive any formal training on grieving families.

"Being part of a small community in Randolph County, most everybody knows everybody else," Wolff said. "We very often see victims or families of victims that we know really well.

"I think that can be a good thing in making them more comfortable talking to us."

'Family is our strength'

Emergency medical technicians and paramedics tend to see people on their worst day.

Investigators at Western Kentucky University have been requesting participation in a 30-minute, online survey that seeks to "identify workplace and personal factors that protect against PTSD and thoughts of self-harm in EMS providers."

Results will be used to identify strategies to reduce risk of suicide. The survey is available at https://wku.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_b3AzeUZhoVhYK4B.

"Honestly, emergency response, we're a family and that's how we function," said Chuck R. Kelley, vice president of MedStar Ambulance, which serves Randolph, St. Clair and Clinton counties. "Our family is our strength and they're usually the ones who get through it.

"We're all friends, we all talk and that's how we get through it."

Kelley was a firefighter for nine years and has been in the EMS business for more than 20.

"Every one of us runs on adrenaline," he said. "We run East St. Louis, Belleville and it's nothing for us to go on eight to 10 shootings a night and we do it because we care.

"It makes us better at our jobs."

Kelley also highlighted compassion fatigue, which is the gradual lessening of compassion over time and can be exhibited in individuals who directly work with trauma victims.

"If we have a problem, we work through it together," Kelley said. "None of us suffer alone."

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