Purpose: The aim of this study was to examine physiological responses to two different simulated firefighting exercises: a firefighting exercise with flashovers, smoke, poor visibility and extreme temperatures (300°) in a burning container and a standard firefighting exercise in temperate conditions. Furthermore, a second purpose of the study was to find out if the contribution of strength and ...

The objective of this study was to evaluate the impact of obesity and firefighting activities on coagulation and fibrinolytic activity in relatively young, apparently healthy firefighters. Firefighters performed simulated firefighting activities for 18 minutes in a live-fire training structure. Blood samples were obtained at baseline, before firefighting, and within a few minutes of completing ...

The aim of this study was to quantify the physical demands of a simulated firefighting circuit and to establish the relationship between job performance and endurance and strength fitness measurements. On four separate days 41 professional firefighters (39 ± 9 yr, 179.6 ± 2.3 cm, 84.4 ± 9.2 kg, BMI 26.1 ± 2.8 kg/m2) performed treadmill testing, fitness testing (strength, balance and flexibility...

UNLABELLED During live-fire firefighting operations and training evolutions, firefighters often consume multiple cylinders of air and continue to wear their personal protective equipment even after fire suppression activities have ceased. However, most studies have only reported core temperature changes during short-term firefighting activities and have shown a very modest increase in core temp...

This study examined the effect of active pre-warming on speed and quality of performance during simulated firefighting exercise. Twelve male firefighters performed two trials in counterbalanced order. They were either pre-warmed by 20-min cycling at 1.5 Watt kg(-)(1) body mass (WARM) or remained thermoneutral (CON) prior to a simulated firefighting activity. After the pre-warming, gastrointesti...

BACKGROUND The leading cause of line-of-duty death among firefighters is sudden cardiac events. Platelets play a critical role in the formation of an occlusive thrombus during an ischemic event. OBJECTIVE The purpose of this study was to examine the acute effect of firefighting on platelet number and aggregability. METHODS Apparently healthy male firefighters (N = 114; age 29.4 ± 7.8 years)...

Sudden cardiac events are responsible for 40-50% of line-of-duty firefighter fatalities, yet the exact cause of these events is unknown. Likely, combinations of thermal, physical, and mental factors impair cardiovascular function and trigger such events. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine the impact of firefighting activities on vascular function. Sixty-nine young (28 ± 1 years...

UNLABELLED Approximately 45%-50% of all duty-related deaths among firefighters are due to sudden cardiovascular events, and a disproportionate number of these fatalities occur after strenuous fire suppression activities. PURPOSE The objective of this study is to evaluate the effect of strenuous firefighting activities on platelets, coagulation, and fibrinolytic activity and to document the ex...

OBJECTIVES The primary objective of this study was to document the timeline of physiologic recovery from firefighting activities in order to inform emergency medical services (EMS) of vital sign values that might be expected during incident rehabilitation and in developing rehabilitation protocols to make decisions about when to return personnel to the fireground. Secondarily, we compared two d...