Why the Fire Service Psychology Association stands alone for firefighter mental health

?Like me, I’m sure you see many postings on LinkedIn and other social media platforms about burgeoning issue of firefighter mental: the challenges firefighters encounter, the available resources (e.g., building resilience, how to reduce stress), and resources for treatment (i.e., intervention, therapy). Personally, as a retired battalion chief/paramedic, I’m ecstatic that we’re helping to increase awareness, for both firefighters and mental health clinicians, and creating resources and options for firefighters.

But—there’s always a but, right? – there’s not enough being done proactively to learn about what causes some firefighters to suffer from exposure to stress and others don’t. Why are firefighters and officers taking their own lives in record numbers?

Regarding firefighters dying by suicide, why is our only data about firefighter suicides coming from anecdotal evidence that’s communicated to the Firefighter Behavioral Health Alliance, a private endeavor initiated by a firefighter, Jeff Dill? (I’m not in any way, shape, or form “dissing” Jeff and his work because without him and his organization we’d be “poking around in the dark” even more than we currently are for numbers about firefighters and suicide).

The Fire Service Psychology Association

I’ve been a fire service member of FSPA since 2018 and I’ve learned what too many fire service leaders don’t know about psychology. And I’ve learned what too many psychologists and masters-level clinicians don’t know about firefighters and officers. Which is why I truly “get” what FSPA’s elevator speech, “Building a bridge between professional psychology and the fire service,” means.

A major component of that bridge needs to be real data collection and analysis, in other words, university-level research. FSPA’s Mission is to Develop the scientific study and application of professional psychology to meet the needs of the fire service.

Only by doing so can we learn why firefighters take their own lives and then develop data-based strategies to reduce those deaths (Anything less is just throwing ideas against a wall to see what sticks). And that’s just one area where we need to conduct research. BTW, psychologists and other PhD-level researchers are the folks who have the knowledge, skills, abilities, and connections to make such research a reality.

FSPA was the first and still the only organization that’s advocating for the inclusion of psychologists in discussions of firefighter mental health at the national level in the U.S. FSPA’s Vision is to help create the specialty of?fire service psychology (Currently there is no such field of psychology recognized by the American Psychological Association (APA) though APA has had recognized fields of psychology for law enforcement and the military services for decades).

Why should that matter to the fire service? How many fire chiefs do you know of whose highest level of education is a high school diploma? I remember when I was earning my B.S. in Fire Safety and Engineering Technology from the University of Cincinnati back in the late 1990’s having one of my professors write back to me “Fire chiefs need to have formal education beyond high school (e.g., B.S. and M.S.) because when they’re sitting around a table seeking to win support for their department’s budget the other people around that table (e.g., mayor, city manager, county administrator, budget director) have those degrees.” His meaning is as clear to me now as it was then: If you want a seat at the poker table you must have the cash to ante up.

Having an APA-recognized field of fire service psychology would (1) demonstrate to the major fire service organizations and their constituents the value of professional psychology, (2) give future psychology students a goal to aspire to, and (3) provide psychologists and fire service leaders with the “cash to ante up” at the poker table (i.e., seeking federal grants for research and program development for the fire service on a national level).

?I'm inviting you to join fire service leaders (like me), psychologists, and other mental health clinicians at FSPA, www.firepsychology.org. Together, we can "build a bridge between professional psychology and the fire service."

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