Webinar - Why Everyday Health Decisions are Important in Reducing Cancer Risks for Firefighters

Sara Jahnke

PhD

Dr. Sara Jahnke is the Director of the Center for Fire, Rescue, and EMS Health Research. She and her team have been doing research on firefighter health for more than a decade with funding from organizations such as FEMA, the National Institutes of Health, and the American Heart Association. Her work has focused on a broad range of topics including cardiovascular disease, carcinogen exposure, risk for injury, fitness, and behavioral health. She had published more than 100 peer reviewed publications in the medical literature. Her current FEMA-funded project focuses on the health of women firefighters including behavioral health, cardiovascular risk factors, cancer screening, and reproductive health.

Improving firefighter health and lessening the risks for critical illness such as cancer takes a multipronged approach that continues off the fireground. While operational considerations such as decon are necessary, research is increasingly pointing to the importance of personal modifiable risk factors, such as nutrition, fitness, tobacco use, and sleep, as key predictors of injury, loss, and developing cancer. Join the NVFC and Sara Jahnke, PhD, Director of the Center for Fire, Rescue & EMS Health Research for this free webinar to discuss the current research on these modifiable risk factors in the fire service setting and why mitigating risk factors requires not only individual, but system level changes in policies, practices, and cultural norms by fire departments.