• Emergency Medical Services
• Fire Departments
• Police Departments
• Hospital Emergency Department Personnel
• Rescue Agencies

We are an organization made up of specially trained people who work in E.M.S., Police, Fire, Rescue and Hospitals. Every member of the C.I.S.D. Network volunteers his or her time. We are dedicated to supporting our colleagues before, during and most of all after a critical incident.

We provide you and your organization with information about Critical Incident Stress, its effects and potential impact on your life and job performance. These sessions are most effective if they are conducted before an incident happens.

Our organization is made of more than 40 people around the state, many whom you probably know. This wide spread membership allows us to come to you, at your facility, when you need us.

You should set up an educational session during your regular training schedule. Our presentation will normally last about an hour to an hour and a half. We also provided three other support services:

1. On or Near Scene Support: If requested, team members can arrive at the scene to watch for signs of acute stress in responders and work with Incident Commanders to support these personnel as necessary.
2. Informal Defusing: This usually takes place within a few hours of the incident and is an informational session for those directly involved in the incident.
3. Debriefing: This is conducted within 24 - 72 hours after the incident. A debriefing is a confidential session which does not critique the incident nor evaluate the responders. The primary focus of a debriefing is to allow those involved to talk about their thoughts and reactions to a stressful incident. Examples of critical incident would include:

• death of a co-worker in the line of duty
• serious injury of a co-worker in the line of duty
• prolonged rescue or recovery operations
• death of a child
• mass casualty incidents
• operations with intense media coverage
• ANY incident with high emotional impact on responders

We are here to help you deal with the extraordinary event(s) that will happen to all of us at some time in our careers. The goal of our organization is to try and prevent members of our profession(s) from dropping out because of an overload of one time stress or the build up of a number of stressful events.

Remember that what may be stressful for one person, may be very stressful for another.

When the Team Leader calls you back, these are things you will be asked when you call for team response:

• Your name and telephone number.
• Your agency name and address and telephone number.
• The perceived urgency of the situation from immediate intervention or a formal debriefing.

We are available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year by contacting St. Joseph Hospital Answering Service and asking for the C.I.S.D. person on call to be paged. We will do our best to answer your call within 30 minutes. The number to call for assistance during or after an event (24 hours) or to schedule an educational session is:

(603) 595-3792 or Mark Proulx 596-4321 (beeper)

During or after an event please call 24 hours a day. To schedule an educational session call 594-3658 Monday thru Friday 8am to 4pm.

Page last updated Thursday, March 31, 2005

webmaster and department e-mail inf@littletonfirerescue.org