Mental Health Correlates of Probable Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, Probable Alcohol Use Disorder, and Their Co-Occurrence among Firefighters. Academic Article uri icon

abstract

  • Firefighters demonstrate high rates of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and alcohol use disorder (AUD). Research has yet to compare how these diagnoses and their co-occurrence relate to firefighter mental health. This study evaluated trauma load, PTSD, alcohol use, depression, sleep, suicide risk, anger, and occupational stress across four discrete groups of firefighters (N=660): (1) trauma-exposed only (n=471), (2) probable PTSD-only (n=36), (3) probable AUD-only (n=125), and (4) probable PTSD-AUD (n=28). Firefighters completed an online survey. Firefighters with probable PTSD-AUD demonstrated higher scores on all criterion variables, except trauma load, compared to firefighters with probable AUD-only or trauma-only. Firefighters with probable PTSD-AUD and probable PTSD-only reported similar levels of all indices, except alcohol use severity and suicide risk, which were higher among the probable PTSD-AUD group. Results provide preliminary empirical evidence of the deleterious impact of PTSD-AUD comorbidity among firefighters.

published proceedings

  • Behav Modif

author list (cited authors)

  • Zegel, M., Lebeaut, A., Healy, N., Tran, J. K., & Vujanovic, A. A.

citation count

  • 10

complete list of authors

  • Zegel, Maya||Lebeaut, Antoine||Healy, Nathaniel||Tran, Jana K||Vujanovic, Anka A

publication date

  • March 2022