By John Sinclair -- The No. 1 job of any officer — chief or line officer — is to make sure a firefighter goes home to his or her family. This mindfulness is always there when you are on the scene and making tactical decisions, be it at a structure fire, a fast-moving brush fire or a car wreck alongside the freeway. But this mindfulness also is needed back at the station looking at strategic issues....More

Between 7% and 10% of firefighters have a BMI over 35 which puts them in the extremely high-risk "severe obesity" category....More

Among other changes, the 2013 edition expands Hepatitis A vaccine to include all fire department members. Most younger candidates and members will have been vaccinated as part of their routine childhood vaccinations....More

There have been recent firefighter-specific pilot programs and studies done at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Atlanta that point the way to a better approach to the detection of heart disease in firefighters....More