Anastasia Miller worked as a firefighter and an EMT for five years in Virginia and New Mexico, so she knows first-hand the stress facing first responders.

  • Study looks at stress management and burnout among first responders
  • Higher levels of burnout among Dispatch and EMS workers
  • Study recommends programs to help agencies individually

“Everybody has to deal with these very traumatic events and it’s kind of hard to shake it off sometimes," said Miller, now a PhD candidate and instructor at the University of Central Florida.

Miller is now studying what first responders need to avoid burnout and better manage stress. The work is the first scientific study of its kind in Florida.

“I got interested in going into academia to do further research because there is very little done about what public safety responders need in order to have the best psychological health for their job," Miller said.

“It becomes a problem when it starts to interfere with your life," Miller added.

Miller found that although 60 percent of first responders displayed low levels of secondary traumatic stress, 39 percent displayed moderate levels and 1 percent displayed high levels.

That's why Miller said it's important to have constant resources in place.

"Ideally there would be something in place because incidents like the Pulse Nightclub shooting are out of the norm and the average tolls on the job do still add up and do still impact first responders," Miller explained.

The PhD candidate said her research shows firefighters benefit more from talking to one another. However what helps law enforcement is more formal stress management debriefing sessions.

"I'm really hoping this can get the conversation started and that more agencies and people will be interested in doing research and getting solid numbers, so that we can move away from the anecdotal evidence," Miller said.