Victoria paramedic Lisa Jennings has received many emails and letters since she spoke out about her experience with post-traumatic stress disorder — an elderly woman wrote about her husband, who was a long-time police officer who took his own life, and a woman wrote to say her son likely wouldn’t be alive if it wasn’t for the help of first responders.
But there was one letter that stood out: a handwritten note on yellow, lined paper, with no name or return address. Jennings — who once considered suicide during her lowest point — read the carefully written words and could see it was a cry for help.
Something in the letter sparked her memory and Jennings was sure she knew the woman. She searched through her email and found a contact for a 911 dispatcher she had talked to in the past. Her instinct was right and the two have connected, trading war stories, showing their battle scars, leaning on each other for support.
Jennings said every person involved in a 911 call, from the dispatcher to the police, firefighters and paramedics, feels its effects.
“Through it all, the very first responder is your 911 operator. But sometimes, they get lost in the shuffle. It’s a team effort,” Jennings said. “We are here 24/7, 365 days of the year to help everyone, every taxpayer, every citizen of B.C., without question. … Who’s taking care of us when we’re down?”
It’s been a month since Jennings launched an email campaign encouraging first responders to share their experiences with PTSD with their MLAs, and she’s heard from dozens of people supportive of her cause.
The goal of the campaign is to pressure the B.C. government to implement “presumptive” disability legislation for PTSD in first responders, recognizing the disorder as a work-related hazard.
That would make it easier for paramedics, police officers and firefighters suffering from PTSD to get compensation from WorkSafe B.C.
NDP MLAs Maurine Karagianis, Judy Darcy and Shane Simpson are calling on the governing Liberals to amend the legislation, similar to 2005 reforms that recognized several types of cancer as a presumptive disability for firefighters.
Jennings said she talked to the woman whose husband, a former police officer, died by suicide. The woman now lives in a seniors’ home up-Island.
“She said [his depression] was never really talked about in their home,” Jennings said. “It’s only just starting to be talked about.”
Jennings has also been emailing mayors across B.C., trying to get municipal councils to support presumptive disability legislation.
A paramedic for 24 years, she has been unable to work since June 24, 2014, after a routine call that went awry triggered a mental-health breakdown that included suicidal thoughts and flashbacks to her most horrific calls.
Jennings, 50, filed a claim for compensation with WorkSafe B.C., saying her PTSD was job-related. WorkSafe B.C. has so far denied her claim, saying her primary psychiatrist did not diagnose PTSD.
She has requested an appeal and submitted an independent medical report by a psychiatrist who found she has significant PTSD symptoms.
Already this year in Canada, seven first responders — five paramedics and two firefighters — and three military members have died by suicide, according to the Tema Conter Memorial Trust, a Toronto-based research group that tracks first-responder deaths.
Jennings said those statistics don’t include another 10 peace officers (including police, corrections officers and border security) who have taken their own lives, numbers she compiled by looking through news stories across the country.
On April 1, hundreds of people showed up for the funeral of Surrey firefighter Kevin Haggerty, who took his own life in March after years of struggling with PTSD.
Haggerty was a champion for better supports for firefighters battling the emotional toll of their job until those emotions became unbearable for him.
Jobs Minister Shirley Bond has said B.C. is already addressing PTSD in the workplace, through amendments to the Workers Compensation Act in July 2012 that give access to workers’ compensation benefits to those with medical evidence that their PTSD was caused by work.
