Abstract
Over the years, the nature of firefighting and the role of firefighters has evolved including a demographic change, with an increasing number of women in this profession. Recent studies have specifically addressed the particular needs of female firefighters. Ill-fitting turnout gear, protective gloves, and other personal protective equipment make female firefighters’ tasks not only uncomfortable but also more difficult and dangerous. A pilot study comprising both male and female firefighters from a fire brigade located in the North of Portugal was conducted. The goal was to investigate the fit of the Portuguese firefighters’ personal protective equipment, its level of adjustment to their anthropometrics and to identify areas that need improvement. This paper focuses on gender differences and presents the preliminary results regarding size selection and purchasing of protective clothing as well as the level of protection experienced among participants.
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Notes
- 1.
In general, includes a turnout gear (coat and pants), helmet, hood, gloves, boots, and a self-contained breathing apparatus.
- 2.
Corresponding to 3.6% of total career firefighters and 9.4% of total volunteer firefighters.
- 3.
Including both career and volunteer.
- 4.
Moraes, A., Boldt, R. Carvalho, M., Ferreira, F. Portuguese firefighters' perceptions concerning protective gloves. In: Proceedings of AUTEX 2019 – 19th World Textile Conference. 11–19 June 2019, Ghent, Belgium (2019).
- 5.
Moraes, A.S.P., Boldts, R.S., Ferreira, F.N., Carvalho, M.A.F, Ashdown, S.P. Assessment of Portuguese firefighters' needs: preliminary results of a pilot study. In: F. Rebelo and M.M. Soares (Eds). Advances in Ergonomics in Design. 721--732 (2020).
- 6.
Moraes, A.S.P., Boldt, R.S., Carvalho, M.A., Ferreira, F.N., Ashdown, S.P., Griffin, L. Portuguese firefighters' boots: obtaining user input for an ergonomic redesign. Journal of Textile Engineering & Fashion Technology. 6(1), 1--7 (2020).
- 7.
Qualtrics Survey Platform.
- 8.
Including turnout coat, turnout pants, fire boots, and fire gloves.
- 9.
In Portugal, career firefighters commonly offer their services on a volunteer basis to their fire brigade in the hours that they are not regularly paid. Usually, they volunteer during night shits and weekend shifts.
- 10.
About 160,000 inhabitants.
- 11.
For this, the manufacturer provides a sample set of sizes and adjust to their individual measurements. According to the study participants, modifications were usually made on the coat sleeve length and on the pants leg length.
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Acknowledgments
We would like to acknowledge the 2C2T-Centre for Textile Science and Technology of the University of Minho. This work is financed by FEDER funds through the Competitive Factors Operational Program (COMPETE) POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007136, by national funds through the FCT-Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology under the project UID/CTM/000264, by Fundo de Apoio às Vítimas dos Incêndios de Pedrógão, and by ICC/Lavoro. We would also like to acknowledge the United States North Central Multistate Research Project titled NC-170 for assistance developing the questionnaire.
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Moraes, A.S.P., Carvalho, M.A.F., Boldt, R.S., Ferreira, F.B.N., Ashdown, S.P., Griffin, L. (2020). A Gender Comparison of Portuguese Firefighters’ Perceptions Concerning Personal Protective Equipment: Results from a Pilot Study. In: Rebelo, F., Soares, M. (eds) Advances in Ergonomics in Design. AHFE 2020. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 1203. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51038-1_22
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