Why mental health support isn’t always used in ambulance services
Lauren Finestone
Workers in ambulance services are most likely to use mental health support when it is embedded in everyday work, trusted and experienced as genuine rather than procedural.Emergency medical service organisations invest heavily in mental health supports. Employee assistance programs, peer support, post-incident debriefing, counselling and wellbeing initiatives are now standard across many services. Yet uptake remains stubbornly low, even as mental ill health and suicide rates among ambulance staff remain significantly higher than in the general population. A systematic review helps explain why. Rather than focusing...
Published 17 February, 2026
