New position: President, Corporate Crisis Management, Tampa. Previous position: President, MECA, Tampa
By FRED W. WRIGHT JR.
Published March 22, 2004
Although Diane Fojt no longer flies as a trauma nurse in medical evacuation helicopters, she is still on call, ready to respond on a moment's notice to businesses and corporations that experience violent incidents.
Fojt is one of three full-time staffers of her new business, Corporate Crisis Management, which she launched Jan. 1. Another 15 or more experts are on call statewide, ready to respond to any type of workplace violence and to provide trauma counseling to victims, survivors, co-workers and even emergency responders.
Fojt and her staff work with "people who have been traumatized or who might develop post-traumatic stress disorder," she said.
"The closer (people) are to an incident - they know the person, they witness it happen, they got involved in resuscitation - the greater the impact," she said. "We absorb trauma through our five senses. The more of that that is stimulated by an event, the greater the arousal response in the body and the greater the chances somebody might develop long-term effects."
Fojt cited the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and noted that studies show at least 4 percent of Americans across the country were traumatized by the events, largely by watching it on live television. "Obviously, the closer to the event, the greater the potential of impact," she said.
"Dealing with traumatized victims is a highly specialized area," she said. "It's not something you go to a three-hour workshop on and turn around and become an expert in."
Fojt's new company also provides training and disaster plan reviews for businesses and training for mental health professionals.
Fojt, who grew up in Tampa, earned a bachelor's degree in industrial technical adult education from the University of South Florida in 1992. She is finishing a master's degree in curriculum and instruction from National-Louis University in Tampa.
Fojt began working in emergency medical services for Florida Ambulance in Pinellas County in 1977, then two years later went back to school to earn an associate's degree in 1982 from Hillsborough Community College in human services technology and to complete paramedic training. Fojt taught at HCC from 1983-86.
She left teaching to work for Bayfront Medical Center and soon began flying, in 1988, on BayFlight medical flights. "It was a blast," she said. "I absolutely loved it. (But) when you get called out for that type of work, it's the worst of the worst."
She moved to Tampa General Hospital in 1989 and helped launch its medical flight program, staying there until 1993. Fojt said she was the first female paramedic to fly for both programs.
Fojt then joined LifeLink of Florida, an organ procurement business, where she was vascular coordinator. Two years later, in 1995, she started her own business, MECA, for Medical Education Consultants of America, to provide emergency medicine and air medical training to medical professionals.
All this time, Fojt continued to develop her skills in "critical incident work," teaching paramedic students at college. "We learn a lot about how to save lives but (there is) no training whatsoever of how to deal with the results when you can't save somebody," she said.
Without the proper training on how to cope with the stress of working with trauma victims, paramedics and first responders often burn out. Fojt admits she did, after a BayFlight crash that killed her partner in April 2000.
"I took care of managing all the services that were required for keeping everyone else from developing (post-traumatic stress disorder)," she said, "and I forgot to take care of myself. I was saying the right things; I just wasn't following the advice."
She said providing trauma support for victims, survivors and responders is vital, and teaching is a way to reach more people.
"I think the work is just so important, and I think there aren't a lot of people in the world who are willing to take on the challenge of dealing with traumatized individuals," she said. "Those of us who have those skills and talents need to stay right where we are taking care of those people."
Fojt said setting boundaries and taking care of yourself is also paramount.
"This work needs to be done in teams because of the intensity and the vicarious trauma, which is transmitted when dealing with people who are dealing with horrible events," she said. The team concept is fundamental to Fojt's new business, which includes in its part-time and full-time staff nurses with 25-plus years of trauma center experience, and law enforcement officers.
In addition, Fojt, 45, continues to provide medical education through MECA, and she helps run a 250-person Community Crisis Support Team for Hillsborough County.
Single, Fojt said she likes to travel and go camping in North Carolina and northern Georgia where she will "sit in a cabin and take no phone with me and do nothing but sit in a hot tub and walk in the woods."
