EMS Employee Wellness Has Passed the Tipping Point

When did employee well-being become a thing? Critical incident stress debriefing, psychological first aid and other post-incident support models have been around for decades. Yet it seems that only in recent years has benefit of intentional, proactive emotional/spiritual support for frontline public safety personnel moved from the margins toward the center of our consciousness. What has fueled this culture change?

The first 20 years of this century brought a gradual increase in awareness of and concern for the emotional weight borne by EMTs, paramedics and dispatchers. Individual leaders in communities around the globe began to ask what could be done to better support their people. As they connected with each other, information was shared.

Researchers have uncovered a phenomenon called informational cascades that helps to illuminate what happened next.¹ “The starting point is that people rationally attend to the informational signals given by the statements and actions of others; we amplify the volume of the very signals by which we have been influenced. Social movements of various kinds…can be understood as a product of cascade effects.”²

An article here, a workshop presentation there, a webinar or consultation by someone recognized as an authority or thought leader—all fed this cascade of information. Support for the well-being of EMS staff grew from an isolated practice to one that is more commonly considered. People paid attention to the social signals, and the reputation of employee wellness grew. Even the skeptics took note, because others in their professional networks were.

Attention to employee wellness as a business practice also benefits from network effects: it is “taken as something of which people think they should be aware.”² Apart from the intrinsic merits of investing in the self-care and well-being of employees, it’s good to know about it, so you can talk to others about it.²

The tipping point came in mid-2020. All of the slow but steady acceptance and growth of employee wellness initiatives got a shot of steroids when the Covid-19 pandemic hit. No longer an option, staff support became a matter of survival. Recruitment and retention of skilled EMTs, paramedics and dispatchers depend on it.

Now the conversation has changed. Instead of asking “do we want to implement wellness programs?” the question is “what kind of support mechanisms are the best fit for our organization?” Choices for where to put your energy include developing a peer support team, hiring a clinically trained, professional chaplain, contracting with a psychologist or social worker, getting a therapy dog, additional training for operations leaders, and other proactive employee support measures

Perhaps this is one positive thing to come out of the pandemic, and it’s a win-win. Employees benefit, the organization benefits, the patients and communities we serve also benefit. Creating and nurturing an organizational culture of support is not only a good idea. It’s the right thing to do.

References

1. Salganik, Matthew J., Dodds, Peter Sheridan and Duncan J. Watts (2006) ‘Experimental Study of Inequality and Unpredictability in an Artificial Cultural Market’, Science 311: 854– 856, 10.1126/science.1121066
2. Sunstein, Cass R.: ‘Beatlemania’, 2022. https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4018431

Resource

‘Head of Team Anywhere,’ and Other Job Titles for an Uncertain Time. New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/04/business/job-titles-remote-work.html?referringSource=articleShare

Russ Myers is chaplain for Allina Health EMS, based in St. Paul and the author of Because We Care: A Handbook for Chaplaincy in Emergency Medical Services. He can be contacted at russell.myers@allina.com