Depression, Anxiety and Stress Management

Generally, when any type of disaster or catastrophe occurs, be it of natural or human origin, there is much talk about the number of victims and deaths, the magnitude of infrastructure and material goods affected, the economic amounts lost in the event, etc.

In the same way, much has been said and written about the psychological impact on victims and the community exposed to such an event. However, there is a type of hidden victims that, in many cases, tend to go unnoticed, perhaps in part because of their resistance to accepting that they are also vulnerable. I am referring to the members of the first response teams in emergencies (fire, police, health, etc.).

The presence of the scene, the proximity to the deadly victims and the nteraction with the survivors, as well as the work in highly toxic atmospheres or of great risk for the physical integrity, together with problems of organizational, familiar or interpersonal type, will exert a strong impact on these troops, with possible repercussions on their physical and mental health.

Moreover, they can be factors of vulnerability to suffer more or less severe episodes of Acute Stress, Post Traumatic Stress and Secondary Traumatic Stress, among others.

In the present work an approximation is made to the Secondary Traumatic Stress (STS) construct, a type of emerging labor condition in the professionals who develop their tasks of help and rescue with people exposed to critical incidents or vital events, as is the case of the  Fire fighter Departments.

Factors such as the history of personal traumas, the organizational context, the characteristics of the intervention and the individual personality, will significantly condition the capacity of resistance to the traumas in the professionals of the Fire Services.