Katherine Kirkland, executive director of the Association of Occupational and Environmental Clinics, speaks about monitoring the health of first responders:
“AOEC is a network of clinics throughout the United States. One of our main clinics is Mount Sinai in NYC, and in post-9/11, when it began to become apparent to the physicians at Mount Sinai that a lot of the workers were having health issues, they arranged for medical monitoring exams. This was in 2003-2004.
“Thanks to the Red Cross, who made several awards, including one to AOEC, we’re now able to pay for further evaluation and treatment, of World Trade Center first responders through AOEC. That’s where Steve comes in, and he’s pretty typical of the types of illnesses we’ve seen from 9/11.
“Primarily, what we’ve been seeing is respiratory, upper-respiratory, persistent cough, some lower-respiratory things that are just starting to appear. Things like gastroesophageal reflux disease. These are all pretty common for 9/11 first responders, like Steve. The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health [www.cdc.gov/niosh] has a list of illnesses that the federal government is paying for – those in the 9/11 area – and then our Red Cross grants help cover those people who don’t live in New York, such as firefighters from out of state who came to help out at Ground Zero.”
Contact: www.aoec.org.
This article appears in December 21 • 2007.