This project will evaluate an integrated educational intervention designed to reduce the impact of psychosocial risk factors and mitigate job stress of wildland firefighters and operational staff at Ontario’s Aviation, Forest Fire and Emergency Services (AFFES). The Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry (MNRF) AFFES employs 800 firefighters and 700 operational personnel, who will be invited to participate in the educational intervention over the course of the 2018 fire season. They will be asked to complete baseline surveys assessing such things as psychosocial risk factors, work engagement, and job stress. Follow-up surveys will be completed at the end of the fire season.

The MNRF reports high levels of injury and absence, and research indicates high job stress is the sole significant predictor of lost-time injuries among wildland firefighters in Ontario. Building on previous research, the researchers aim to improve the health of AFFES workers and provide results which will be meaningful to firefighting operations in similar contexts across Canada.