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Skilled Care Nursing
Beverage Distribution
Package Distribution
Utilities - Gas & Electric
Manufacturing
Refineries - Oil & Chemical

Municipal Risk Insurance Pools
- Law Enforcement
- Fire and EMS Services
- Public Works

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Fire Suppression and EMS Services

Every occupation carries degrees of safety and risk. But there is no argument that firefighting is an extremely dangerous occupation. Due to the physically demanding and unpredictable nature of their work, firefighters are frequently injured in the line of duty. Most Firefighter emergency calls are medical emergency or traffic related emergency, often requiring patient handling, extrication and transport.

Most people would assume that burns and smoke inhalation would be the primary cause of injuries to fire fighters. While these type of injuries are still quite prevalent, there have been notable technological advances such as
improved personal protective gear and technologically advanced apparatus. The
outer body of a fire fighter is well protected. However, there has been little advancement in safeguarding the inner body. Indeed, the largest source of injuries for fire fighters is physical trauma to the musculo-skeletal frame.
More specifically, back and shoulder related injuries account for over 50% of injuries suffered by fire fighters, particularly for the older and thus more experienced fire fighters. These injuries are often the sum total of all traumas that have occurred in the firefighter's career. Overexertion is a primary causative factor for muscle injuries, many of which involve the back
and shoulders.

An example of a circumstance, in firefighting, paramedic response, and emergency medical services, in which it is difficult to protect the back/spine of the responder is while carrying a cardiac patient on a back board down a narrow flight of stairs. If the patient shifts, causing the bottom-side EMT to momentarily lose footing (even while braced with a 3rd responder stabilizing
the backward moving responder), the load gets away from the person at the head and - being on stairs - precludes quick, large foot movement to retrieve the load. This unanticipated response causes the back to do more work than it's capable of in that instant. Nobody drops the backboard.

Similarly, extricating even a frail, light cardiac patient from the narrow space between a wall and a commode requires quickly reaching for the patient over an obstruction that cannot quickly be removed or taken out of the way, and space constraints might well allow only one responder to initiate the first few inches of the lift while reaching over an impedence.

These scenarios need occur only a few times in a career to initiate a chronic back-related problem. The issue is not just whether the officer is physically fit or whether or not the EMS responder is aware of correct positional actions to prevent back injury. The real issue, or the primary work-behavior is critical performance demand in a time driven response environment.

Certainly awareness programs for flexibility and guidelines on permissible weight loading can improve statistics. But the bottom line issue becomes fatigue. When physical fatigue sets in, so does mental fatigue. The performance need is productivity and /or completing the task. To reduce the cumulative buildup of disability in the labor-intensive employee, you must prevent back injury without ignoring the performance need.

Certainly wellness programs developing strength and flexibility along with guidelines on permissible weight loading can improve statistics. But the bottom line issue becomes the 'real world' demand on the job.

Then there is the subject of fatigue. When physical fatigue sets in, so does mental fatigue. Since calls come in 24 hours a day, often causing disturbed sleep and rest, in order to reduce the cumulative buildup of disability in this labor-intensive emergency services employee, work performance needs cannot be ignored.

Injured firefighters, soldiers, and police officers are not only a danger to themselves, but the safety of their co-workers and the people they serve can be compromised. It is therefore critical to to enhance worker durability and optimize job performance.

Modifying risk in this high-risk work arena means modifying behavior, as it is not possible to modify the working environment, such as a medical incident, traffic incident or burning structure. It is not possible to premeditate all incorrect actions and excise them. Physical behavior is a
product of physical and psychological response patterns to the demands of a particular job.

The behavioral modification or enhancement must parallel the employee's perceived performance needs. It requires a "whole" approach to understanding the employee, with study and insight into the work-specific nature of the employee's perceptions. This process varies by entity, department and employee.

EMS technicians and fire fighters need to know how to optimize physical and psychological control, not only for back safety on the job, but for every action - routine to extreme. If the work experience doesn't make them stronger, it will break them down. Safe work behavior must be autonomic reflex behavior 24 hours a day.

Job-specific professional development as opposed to awareness education is critical in the high-risk and/or labor-intensive work arena. This development is called PSR®, Professional Safeguard Response®.

In public safety, it's accepted practice to have specialized professional development protocols early in the career, at the academy level. This practice must extend to specialized physical imprinted mind - body practices. These need to include all elements of physical and psychological behavior as they relate to work-strengthening interventions in the workplace very specific to the actual demands of the employee with the acquired experiences, injuries and practices.

The PSR® - Professional safeguard Response® - body response safety imprinting© system was developed for public safety personnel by a unique California agency in the early 1980's - the PSR® Corporation -  and over the last 25 years, has proven highly effective and produced significant reductions in the primary injuries which occur to high risk emergency response personnel. Upwards of 100 public safety (Fire & Police) agencies across the United States
have PSR® installed. It has been adapted and successfully applied to a spectrum of other special emphasis work arenas in the federal and private sector.

PSR® is distinguished as career specific safety training imprinted into actual performance demand for Public Safety personnel. The loss control program relies on the responder's own body skills, establishing the kinesthetic body experience of stability and leverage, to become career work hardening, which does not rely on standardized positioning of the the body to prevent injury.

A correct whole unit body effort is imprinted. It is self reinforcing and matures into the ongoing job performance demands and becomes reflexive behavioral pattern, as it does with a professional athlete,  requiring minimum reinforcement for the career of the employee.
     
In response to increasing demand from entities, pools, and insurers, PSR® Corporation is - for the first time in its 25 year history - making its specialized imprinting training systems available as a licensed product which will permit the training of public entity facilitator specialists who are certified in the PSR® system. This will allow public safety training officers to represent City Fire and Police agencies and become certified in the PSR® training systems which can then be incorporated into ongoing training protocols.

This licensing of larger entities, allowing certification of trainers, has direct application for intergovernmental pools for large numbers of employees and/or large geographical or insurer market areas. The completion of PSR® Certified training has gained the recognition of both risk managers and insurers as well as the Chief administrators of large agency pools, as it provides uniform quality control, sustainability, and accountability for the critical workforce infrastructure .

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