First Responder Wellness Research

🔥 What if firefighter resilience training focused not only on managing stress, but also on changing the relationship responders have with their thoughts?

I love seeing others looking at this approach too!

A peer-reviewed conceptual paper proposes a Metacognitive-Mindfulness Model for Resilience among firefighters.

Metacognition means recognizing and managing patterns such as worry, rumination, threat monitoring, avoidance, and thought suppression.

Mindfulness involves observing thoughts, emotions, and physical reactions without immediately judging, avoiding, or trying to control them.

🧠 The proposed model combines:

• Early mental health screening and identification
• Strategies for interrupting unhelpful thinking patterns
• Present-moment awareness and emotional acceptance
• Individualized mental health support
• Peer and group-based resilience activities
• Family education and support
• Leadership involvement and organizational wellness policies

Why does this matter?

Firefighters require threat awareness to perform their jobs safely. However, remaining mentally locked into threat-monitoring mode after the call ends may contribute to worry, rumination, sleep problems, avoidance, and emotional distress.

The authors suggest that combining metacognitive and mindfulness strategies could help firefighters:

✅ Recognize when operational thinking patterns are no longer helpful
✅ Disengage from cycles of worry and rumination
✅ Reduce avoidance and emotional suppression
✅ Strengthen psychological flexibility
✅ Build resilience at the individual, group, and organizational levels

Important context:

This article presents a conceptual model, not the results of an intervention study. The combined model has not yet been tested for feasibility, acceptability, or effectiveness. It should be viewed as a framework for future research, not evidence that the complete program currently works.

What mental skills should be included in proactive firefighter wellness training?

Reference:
Joseph, A., & Jose, T. P. (2026). A conceptual metacognitive mindfulness model for enhancing resilience and mental well-being among firefighters. Discover Public Health, 23, Article 346. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12982-026-01742-3

🚨 Are you registered for Answering the Call?

I will be speaking at the Tennessee First Responders Foundation Su***de Prevention Task Force’s 5th Annual Conference, and I look forward to meeting many of you there!

📅 October 19 and 20, 2026
📍 Williamson Family Farms
3250 Wilkinson Pike
Murfreesboro, Tennessee

This conference brings together first responders, peer supporters, mental health professionals, and others committed to improving su***de prevention and wellness throughout the first responder community.

Registration is $125, and the deadline is October 13. CAPCE and POST continuing education credits are approved.

Will I see you there?

🔗 Register and learn more:
https://www.tnfirstrespondersfoundation.com/

***deprevention

Oklahoma friends and those within driving distance of Stillwater, this one is for you!

We’re just about a month away from the 2026 Research to Practice Symposium at Oklahoma State University, and registration is FREE.

On September 29, I’ll be joining an incredible group of speakers for Strength in Service: Advancing First Responder Resilience Through Research & Practice.

If you are a first responder, peer support team member, agency leader, therapist, counselor, social worker, or other behavioral health professional in Oklahoma or the surrounding region, I would love to see you there.

The day will bring together research and real-world practice with a shared goal of improving how we support the mental health, wellness, and resilience of first responders. I’m especially looking forward to connecting with first responders and clinicians doing this work in their own communities.

📅 September 29, 2026
📍 Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, OK
⏰ 8:30 AM–3:30 PM
🎓 Behavioral Health CEUs available + CLEET approved
💲 FREE registration

If you’re anywhere near Stillwater, come spend the day with us! And please share this with first responders, therapists, peer support teams, or agencies in the Oklahoma region who might be interested.

🔗 Register: okla.st/R2P2026

🚨 First responders spend their careers rescuing others. This event is focused on supporting the people behind the uniform.

Rescuing the Rescuer: The 99 Initiative is a free regional conference centered on first responder mental health, peer support, and family resilience.

📅 Saturday, September 12, 2026
⏰ Begins at 8:00 a.m.
📍 Church of the Harvest, Olive Branch, Mississippi
🎟️ Free registration

This event offers first responders, healthcare professionals, spouses, families, peer supporters, and community members an opportunity to have honest conversations about the challenges that can follow responders home after the shift ends.

You do not have to carry the weight of the job alone. Register and share this opportunity with someone who may need it.

🔗 Event details and registration:
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/rescuing-the-rescuer-the-99-initiative-tickets-1996115897383?utm-campaign=social&utm-content=attendeeshare&utm-medium=discovery&utm-term=listing&utm-source=wsa&aff=ebdsshwebmobile&fbclid=IwY2xjawT5dZxwZG9mA2V4dG4DYWVtAjEwAGJyaWQRMTQ3dHVvOHhXSkoyZVVaMlZzcnRjBmFwcF9pZA81MTQ3NzE1NjkyMjgwNjEAAR7092xyYy1pugR_U_T4zulauoM27J7e2ezS7pQ6wPQ2udmuTRn_nVmPbPsxrg_aem_J59-CRjgm5Xb0DVDcuHxAA

Rescuing the Rescuer: The 99 Initiative Rescuing the Rescuer: Raw truth, mental resilience, and spiritual restoration for frontline families.

🔥 The stress affecting firefighters does not only come from emergency calls.

A new systematic review examined how job-related stress is associated with the physical and mental health of firefighters.

The review included 34 studies involving 87,242 firefighters across Asia, North America, Europe, and South America.

🔎 Key findings:

• Firefighters who perceived their organizational system as unfair or lacking in support had eight times higher odds of reporting depressive symptoms in one longitudinal study.

• Discrimination and harassment among female firefighters were associated with more than twice the odds of PTSD symptoms and anxiety.

• A lack of workplace reward was associated with gastrointestinal and musculoskeletal disorders.

• Organizational demands and burnout may reinforce each other, creating a cycle that becomes increasingly difficult to interrupt.

• Social support, self-efficacy, resilience, and distress tolerance consistently helped buffer the effects of occupational stress.

Why does this matter?

Firefighter wellness cannot rest entirely on teaching individual responders to cope better. Departments must also examine the workplace conditions contributing to stress.

✅ Improve organizational fairness
✅ Strengthen supervisor and peer support
✅ Reduce interpersonal conflict
✅ Address discrimination and harassment
✅ Provide confidential reporting options
✅ Support resilience without ignoring organizational responsibility

The authors caution that 91.7% of the included studies were cross-sectional. The findings identify strong associations, but they do not prove that job stress directly caused the reported health outcomes.

What changes could fire service leadership make to reduce unnecessary organizational stress?

🔗 Read the full peer-reviewed article:
https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-026-28923-8

Reference:
Kazemi Pakdel, F., Kazemi Pakdel, A., Shafi Zadeh, M., Abbasi, S., & Tighkar Polkoii, O. (2026). The associations between job stress and physical and mental health in firefighters: A systematic review. BMC Public Health. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-026-28923-8

Sharing:

Hi everyone! I'm Liana, an EMT here in Oregon.

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I wrote So You're Dating a First Responder to close that gap — it's for the people loving any of us, in any role, so they finally have something that explains what we can't always say out loud. If your partner's ever said "I just don't get it," this might be the thing that helps them get it.

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Glad to be here. 🚑

📞 The voices behind 911 carry more than most people realize.

A peer-reviewed scoping review examined depression and suicidal ideation among 911 call takers, dispatchers, and other public safety communicators.

🔎 Key findings:

• Depression rates ranged from 8.4% to 73% across 11 quantitative studies.

• Suicidal ideation appeared to be significantly higher among communicators than in the general population, although it has received less research attention.

• Major risk factors included repeated exposure to traumatic calls, shift work, emotional suppression, organizational neglect, and previous trauma.

• Depression and suicidal ideation frequently occurred together.

• Peer support, debriefing, and trauma-informed training may help, but these supports are inconsistently available and have not been adequately evaluated.

Why does this matter?

911 professionals may not physically enter an emergency scene, but they hear the crisis, guide the response, and sometimes remain connected to callers during the worst moments of their lives.

Supporting dispatchers requires more than telling them to be resilient. Agencies should consider:

✅ Regular and confidential mental health screening
✅ Trauma-informed supervisors and leadership
✅ Accessible peer and professional support
✅ Policies that address staffing, workload, and shift-related stress
✅ Long-term evaluation of wellness programs

The authors caution that most available studies used cross-sectional designs, self-report measures, inconsistent screening tools, and samples with limited demographic diversity. More inclusive and longitudinal research is needed.

What support does your agency provide for the professionals behind the headset?

If you or someone you know is experiencing suicidal thoughts or a mental health crisis in the United States or Canada, call or text 988.

🔗 Read the full peer-reviewed article:
Reference:
Rani, D., Foley, G., Lynn, C., Johnson, D., William, T., & Cassiano, M. S. (2025). The weight of words: A scoping review of depression and suicidal ideation among 911 call takers and dispatchers. Health & Justice, 13, Article 66. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40352-025-00376-y

***deprevention

🔒 Correctional officers are first responders too, but their mental health is often overlooked.

Correctional officers work in environments shaped by violence, threats, self-harm, death, chronic understaffing, organizational pressure, and constant vigilance. The effects of this work can follow officers far beyond the prison gates.

This mixed-method study examined correctional officers’ mental health and their perceptions of prison work.

🔎 Key findings:

⚠️ Workplace adversity was associated with greater burnout.

🛡️ Resilience helped protect officers from burnout, but individual resilience was not the only factor that mattered.

🤝 A sense of workplace belonging was positively associated with well-being and post-traumatic growth.

🧠 Adaptive coping strategies were also connected to better well-being and growth following difficult experiences.

👥 Social support was an important predictor of officer well-being.

🔄 Officers described prison work as changing how they viewed themselves, other people, and the world around them.

Some officers felt increasingly different from civilians who had not experienced correctional work.

Why does this matter?

Correctional officer wellness cannot depend entirely on officers becoming more resilient.

Organizations also shape well-being through:

✅ Staffing and workload
✅ Supervisor and peer support
✅ Workplace belonging
✅ Recognition and reward
✅ Access to culturally informed mental health care
✅ Opportunities to recover after critical incidents
✅ A culture that allows officers to ask for help

When the work is high risk but officers experience little recognition, control, or support, the effects can extend into their mental health, relationships, identity, and life outside the facility.

This study used self-reported and mixed-method data from Australian correctional officers. The findings provide important insight into their experiences, but they should not be interpreted as proving that specific workplace factors directly caused the reported outcomes.

Correctional officers protect others every day. Their organizations must also protect them.

What would make correctional officers feel more supported within their workplace?

🔗 Read the full article:
Miller, O., Bruenig, D., & Shakespeare-Finch, J. (2026). High risk, low reward: A mixed method exploration of correctional officer mental health and perceptions of prison work. Journal of Crime and Justice, 49(2), 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1080/0735648X.2025.2457591
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🔥 Firefighter stress is not only about what happens on the call.

Firefighters face critical incidents, physical hazards, long shifts, and repeated exposure to trauma. They may also experience chronic workplace stressors such as organizational injustice, interpersonal conflict, discrimination, harassment, limited support, and a lack of recognition.

A newly published systematic review examined how job-related psychosocial stress is associated with firefighters’ physical and mental health.

Researchers reviewed 34 studies involving 87,242 firefighters across Asia, North America, Europe, and South America.

🔎 The review examined six areas:

• Depression and suicidality
• PTSD, anxiety, and burnout
• Alcohol-related problems
• Sleep quality
• Cardiovascular, musculoskeletal, and gastrointestinal health
• Physical performance

Key findings included:

🧠 Organizational system stress was strongly associated with self-reported depressive symptoms.

⚠️ Among female firefighters, discrimination and harassment were associated with greater odds of self-reported PTSD and anxiety symptoms.

🦴 A lack of workplace reward was associated with gastrointestinal and musculoskeletal problems.

😴 Job stress was also connected to sleep problems and other physical health concerns.

💪 Less experienced firefighters demonstrated greater physiological stress responses.

🛡️ Social support, self-efficacy, and resilience consistently helped buffer the effects of job-related stress.

Why does this matter?

Firefighter wellness cannot focus only on individual resilience.

Resilience training may help, but it cannot correct organizational injustice, discrimination, unresolved conflict, inadequate leadership, or unhealthy working conditions.

Departments should consider:

✅ Fair and transparent workplace policies
✅ Strong supervisor and peer support
✅ Conflict prevention and resolution
✅ Anti-discrimination and anti-harassment protections
✅ Preventive mental health services
✅ Organization-wide stress reduction strategies

The evidence was predominantly cross-sectional, meaning these findings show associations rather than proving that workplace stress directly caused the health outcomes.

This article is also currently available as an early, unedited version and may receive minor corrections before final publication.

Firefighters deserve workplaces that do not add preventable harm to an already demanding profession.

Which organizational stressor has the greatest effect on firefighter wellness?

🔗 Read the full article:

Pakdel, F. K., Pakdel, A. K., Shafi Zadeh, M., Abbasi, S., & Tighkar Polkoii, O. (2026). The associations between job stress and physical and mental health in firefighters: A systematic review. BMC Public Health. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-026-28923-8
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🔥 Firefighter mental health training should feel relevant to the fire service.

Mental health education programs are increasingly offered to firefighters, but programs can differ in their content, delivery, and connection to the realities of the job.

This qualitative study compared firefighters’ experiences with three programs:

• Resilient Minds
• Road to Mental Readiness
• Before Operational Stress

Researchers interviewed 14 participants who had taken or delivered at least two of these programs.

🔎 Key findings:

✅ Participants viewed all three programs as helpful.

✅ The programs shared some goals, topics, skills, and teaching methods.

✅ Resilient Minds emphasized active group participation and practical skills for supporting yourself, peers, and community members.

✅ Road to Mental Readiness and Before Operational Stress were described as more lecture-based and primarily focused on the individual.

✅ Among participants who completed Resilient Minds and another program, 70% preferred Resilient Minds.

Participants connected this preference to:

• Fire-specific content
• Active teaching methods
• Practical skill development
• Opportunities for group participation

Why does this matter?

Mental health training should not be selected only because it is available or widely recognized. The way a program is taught, its occupational relevance, and whether firefighters can apply the skills in real situations may influence how valuable the training feels.

Participants also suggested using a tiered approach to firefighter mental health education. Rather than relying on one isolated training, departments could provide different levels of education and skill development across a firefighter’s career.

This was a small qualitative study focused on participants’ experiences and preferences. It did not test whether one program produced better mental health outcomes than another.

Firefighters deserve mental health education that speaks their language, reflects their work, and gives them skills they can actually use.

What makes a mental health training feel useful within the fire service?

🔗 Read the full article:
Stretton, S. M., MacDermid, J. C., Lomotan, M., & Killip, S. C. (2025). A comparison of firefighter mental health education programs: A descriptive thematic analysis of firefighter experiences. Comprehensive Psychiatry, 136, 152547. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.comppsych.2024.152547
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