Need of Social and Emotional Support - Essay Example

EMS Personnel: In Need Of Social And Emotional Support Introduction Emergency medical service (EMS) is an occupation that has a potential to provide both, emotional and mental satisfaction to EMS personnel as it involves the act of saving lives. EMS personnel do their best to attend the emergency calls and provide relief to the people in critical conditions. However, because of lack of proper training to deal with extreme physical and psychological demands of the job, lack of support at work place and humiliating treatment at the hands of the clients, people working in the EMS are becoming vulnerable to psychological disorders like posttraumatic stress disorder, sleep disorder, depression, anxiety and suicide. The only solution to the problem is to tackle the problem at root level by: 1) training the personnel to deal with different forms of violence and threat they experience at the hands of the clients and other people while doing their duties and, 2) to implement the programs that encourage and enhance emotional and social bonding between the personnel at the work place. The meaning of trauma Trauma influences the shaping of the mentality of the patient suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder (Gordon,2007,p. 12). The situations that can be identified as traumatic are “the situations where a person can feel threat to his life, helplessness, witnessing horror, isolation and identification with victim” (Gordon,2007,p. 12). Due to the widespread view that trauma influences the shaping of the personality, clinicians think that everyone who goes through the traumatic experiences are ‘traumatized’ and need treatment. However, the important point here is that people who are trained to handle traumatic situations have the ability to cope with it if given little space, time, support and security (Gordon,2007,p. 13). According to a study by Friedman, Ritchie and Watson (2006), from 95 percent of people who report distress and some symptoms after traumatic experience, only 10-25 percent of people display symptoms that can be diagnosed as posttraumatic stress disorder. Remaining people experience decrease in the symptoms and experience complete recovery in a year’s time (Gordon,2007,p. 13). Trauma can be defined as an intense and meaningful experience that can injure and harm the normal psychological, physical and social functioning of a human being (Gordon,2007,p. 14). Incidences like accidents, injuries, violence and disasters are the events that can be traumatic for people who witness it or are victim of it (Gordon,2007,p. 14). However, at the same time, it can be even more traumatic for people who work in the field of emergency services, like ambulance officers and emergency medical service personnel . People who witness a trauma or experience it only once or twice in their lifetime have chances of recovery from the psychological effects of it. But what about those people who witness the human distress, horror, destruction and medical emergency every day of their working life? As it is a regular experience for them, they are extremely vulnerable to the psychological condition called ‘posttraumatic stress disorder.’ Factors contributing to development of Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) People who are working in the professions related to emergency health services, are most vulnerable to the psychological disorders like PTSD and depression as they experience and witness traumatic situations every day. At the same time, they also suffer psychological and physical harassment of various nature from their clients and from their colleagues at workplace (Chappell & Mayhew, 2009, p.38) . With regards to health workers, occupational violence has been defined as “incidences where staff are abused, threatened or assaulted in circumstances related to their work, including commuting to or from work, involving an explicit or implicit challenge to their safety, well-being o health” (Chappell & Mayhew, 2009, p.38). A study of 2,640 ambulance officers revealed not only the various forms of insults and verbal abuse the health workers have to go through at the hands of their clients but also how often they have to experience it when they are doing their duty (Chappell & Mayhew, 2009, p.39). One of the interviewee in the research said that he hears the four lettered abusive word every fortnight and if he does not take it lightly, then there are chances of him going into depression (Chappell & Mayhew, 2009, p.39). One can imagine the emotional distress of people who work in emergency services if they have to go through these experiences. The distressing thing is that the abuse does not come only from the clients but also from their relatives and bystanders at the emergency scenes. In the study of 40 operational ambulance officers, it was found that while 29 incidences of verbal abuse came from client, 20 incidences of verbal abuse came from people who were related to the client (Chappell & Mayhew, 2009, p.40). The study also disclosed a harassment of physical nature like sexual harassment and bullying at the work place(Chappell & Mayhew, 2009, p.40). Moreover, the nature of the job of paramedics demand them to be mentally and physically alert any time of the day or night. The emergency calls at the night time make them vulnerable to violence outside the pubs and other public places caused by people who are under the influence of alcohol or drugs. Most of the ambulance officers said that people between the age group of 16-40 act violently towards them (Chappell & Mayhew, 2009, p.41). This shows that person working in the EMS, whose job is to save the victims of the trauma, is himself becoming victim of the traumatic experience like verbal abuse, bullying and physical harassment. The job of the EMS personnel is extremely demanding on all the levels like emotional, physical and psychological. The following are the work related expectations that show how demanding the job is: 1. People working in EMS are expected to be calm, supporting and quiet even in the face of verbal abuse, threats or emotional outbursts from their clients. They are expected to be in control of their emotions and show no anger or frustration even after being abused. 2. Being related to emergency and life threatening situations, they have to be prepared to work at any time of the day or night. This can stretch the shift hours and also disturbs the sleep cycle (Raphael, Taylor, Jacobs & Looi, 2009, p.9). 3. The nature of the work is such that they have to work beyond their skill sets, training and capabilities (Raphael et al, 2009, p.9). For example, they are not trained to deal with violence and verbal abuse from the clients or to deal with physical attack from the clients. Consequences of the stressful job situation. The stress and the emotional distress caused by such traumatic experiences lead to the people working in health services to take high number of leaves, resign from the job, take early retirement and indulging in self destructive behavior (Chappell & Mayhew, 2009, p.48). The study of ambulance officer stress levels showed that the officers who experienced three or more incidences of violence and who were the victim of bullying were at the stage where the remedial measures to prevent the potential mental health problems or the treatment of the proven mental health problems should have been implemented (Chappell & Mayhew, 2009, p.48). However, the action to help them was not taken. This shows that their problem is being ignored. These expectations of superhuman qualities with no warmth or psychological support in return, causes great stress to the people working in emergency health services. The challenges of their job and the exposure to psychologically traumatic experiences like physical injury, workplace death, an assault or threatening event can take its toll on the mental health of a person working in paramedics(Raphael et al, 2009, p.11). This can cause the person to suffer from syndrome of acute stress disorder and if the remedial measures are not taken, then the subsequent exposure to traumatic situations and avoidance of the treatment can lead to diagnosis of posttraumatic stress disorder (Raphael et al, 2009, p.12). Not only that, but if timely steps are not taken, then the exposure to trauma can develop other mental disorders like depression, anxiety, sleep disorder, drug and alcohol problem, health behavior changes, maladjustment in social and personal relationship (Raphael et al, 2009, p.15). A study has also revealed that the ambulance personnel have more health problems like blood pressure, musculoskeletal and physical health problems than general population (Sterud, Ekeberg & Hem, 2006). A study conducted by Essex and Scott revealed that the stress of the job demand of EMS personnel is casing emotional exhaustion and depersonalization to a great extent (Essex & Scott, 2008, P.74). It also revealed that lack of social support at work plays a major part in causing chronic stress among health care personnel (Essex & Scott, 2008, P.74). According to American Psychiatric Association (2003), “for the diagnosis of PTSD to be made, the affected individual will have experienced or witnessed an event that involved actual or threatened death or serious injury, or a threat to the physical integrity of self or others, and that their immediate response involved intense fear, helplessness, or horror” (Bennett, 2005, p.216). Looking at this criteria for the diagnosis of PTSD, one can understand how vulnerable are the EMS personnel to PTSD, being in the job that exposes them to uncertain threat situations and injury every day. Study by Brewin and Holmes (2003) revealed that the emotional suppression leading to disassociation also contribute to development of PTSD, as it disturbs the cognitive processing required to integrate the emotional and cognitive responses to the situation (Bennett, 2005, p.216). However, what really needs to be noted is the fact that more than the emergency incidents, the cause of the stress among the EMS personnel is the maladjustment they experience at work place (Bennett, 2005, p.216). Getting bullied at work is a common and traumatic experience. The threat of losing a job or being ignored by the authorities refrain the victims from reporting it to the authorities. This leads to dissatisfaction, fear and loss of interest in the job. The dissatisfaction and maltreatment at work can cause problems in personal life too. In this way, there is a potential of EMS personnel getting into a vicious cycles of maladjustments. The society has to realize that the job the EMS personnel are doing is extremely physically demanding, emotionally draining and invaluable in nature. To make their job easy and satisfactory, society needs to take a responsibility of showing warmth, trust and understanding towards them. References: Bennett, P., Williams, Y., Page, N., Hood, K., Woollard, M. & Vetter, N. (2005). Associations between organizational and incident factors and emotional distress in emergency ambulance personnel. British Journal Of Clinical Psychology. 44: 215-226 Chappell, D. & Mayhew, C. (2009). Ambulance Officers: the impact of exposure to occupational violence on mental and physical health. Journal Of Occupational Health Safety, 25(1): 37-49 Essex, B. & Scott, B. (2008). Chronic Stress And Associated Coping Strategies Among Volunteer EMS Personnel. Prehospital Emergency Care. 12(1): 69-75 Gordon, R. (2007). Thirty Years Of Trauma Work: Clarifying and Broadening The Consequences Of Trauma. Psychotherapy In Australia. 13 (3): 12-19 Raphael, B., Taylor, M., Jacobs, J. & Looi, J. (2009). Strategies for occupational mental health protection. Journal Of Occupational Health Safety.25(1) : 7-17 Sterud, T., Ekeberg, Ø. & Hem, E. (2006). Health status in the ambulance services: a systematic review. BMC Health Services Research 2006. Retrieved October 12, 2009 from http://www.biomedcentral.com/1472-6963/6/82 Read More