Mental Health Effects on Police Officers Homework Help

Mental Health Effects on Police Officers

Description of the Topic (with historical component) Scope of the problem/Issue/Topic including statistics/facts Both sides of an issue Cross-Cultural Comparisons Learning Outcomes, Findings, Solutions, Summary & Conclusion 2 Graphs or Charts

Mental Health Effects on Police Officers

Ronald (1998) says the nature of police work puts them at a greater risk of having stress and that “police culture” does not favor police officers who show they have problems. Police officers find themselve putting on a false bravado in all circustances but continually suffer silently. A researcher from Buffalo University conducted a five year study of stress on police officers and its effects on psychological and health. The study revealed a link between daily stress factors of officers and cases of obesity, suicide, cancer, insomnia among other general health disparities police officers suffered from compared to people from the general population (n.p, 2012).

40 percent of police officers involved in the study were obese and over 25 percent suffered from metabolic syndrome compared with a figure of 18.7 percent of people in the general population. Female officers were found to be four times likely to have poor quality sleep while the male experiencing a bad-night’s-sleep was six times more likely. Police officers were at a higher risk of developing brain cancer, Hodgkin’s lymphoma and recorded higher suicide rates of working officers being eight times likely to commit suicide compared to retired officers (n.p, 2012).

Police officers need to have training on stress before being recriuted to prepare them of the situations they may encouter in their police duty like murder, shootings, murdered abused children among others. Also police officers require continous on-the-job training to acquire skills to know how to handle murderous victims, suicidal victims among others as these victims can be dangerous if not properly handled as they may harm themselves and police officers trying to assist (Ronald, 1998).

In conclusion, it is of paramount importance to ensure that police officers get skills to enable them handle stress factors and also to be able to calmdown agitated victims. It is the responsibilty of every police department to organise stress training of its police officers to counter burnout and stress on its officers.

References

n.p. (2012, July 12). “Serious Health Risks among Police Officers Due To Stress.” Medical News Today.Retrieved from
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/247781.php.

RONALD, J. B. (1998). Burnout in police work AN EXAMINATION OF THE CHERNISS MODEL. Group & Organization Studies (1986-1998), 12(2), 174. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/232783138?accountid=45049

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