Submitted by Pam Hancock - Senior Safety & Risk Management Consultant
Submitted by Pam Hancock – Senior Safety & Risk Management Consultant For those of you that attended Preferred Member Education Day on April 4, you might remember the first speaker Ryan Gallik presented the question to the audience “who can show me four phone numbers for your employees to reach out to for mental health assistance?” Well, Greater Naples Fire is the member that answered his request.
Greater Naples Fire makes employee health and wellbeing a priority. Healthy employees are happy employees says Tara Bishop, Director of Administration and Finance. Tara understands seeking help with regard to mental health is a very private and personal area, especially with firefighters and EMT’s. Help related information and resources needs to be easily and readily accessible. It must be in a format that first responders feel comfortable using. Greater Naples Fire has provided access to several mental health resources on their INTRANET, which is accessible to employees.
They have also added a mental health assessment video on their site to assist firefighters in gaining a better understanding of PTSD and stress on the job.
Greater Naples Fire also joins with Local 2396 providing information brochures to all employees. Brochure topics include Traumatic Stress, Crisis Intervention and Suicide Prevention with Hotline phone numbers should they wish to speak with a professional privately.
Deputy Chief Rob Low, the Districts Training /Special OPS officer manages this area from a training aspect. DC Low’s team works as the first line of support for the Fire Fighters otherwise known as the Peer Support System. The Peer Support System can help fire fighters with personal issues and other work related issues beyond PTSD. Greater Naples works diligently to incorporate the Peer Support System as part of their Safety Program.
If you have questions or need assistance with regard to offering your employees similar sources of information, please feel free to contact Tara Bishop at Greater Naples Fire, she will be happy to put you in touch with the right people.
Preferred not only appreciates the care taken by Greater Naples to provide their employees with the resources they need pertaining to mental health, we appreciate them sharing how they do it with all of us.
KUDOS to the GREATER NAPLES FIRE DEPARTMENT TEAM.
KEY STAFF CONTACTS:
As a member of Preferred your first call should always be to your agent, if however you need help beyond your agent please feel free to contact us as indicated below:
Marketing:
Operations:
Loss Control:
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