PTSD in railroad drivers under the Federal Employers' Liability Act

Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law

Volumn 34, Issue 2, 2006, Pages 191-199

  Weiss, Kenneth J ^a,b,c   Farrell, J Michael ^c  

^a Delaware Valley Research Associates   (United States)

^b RUTGERS ROBERT WOOD JOHNSON MEDICAL SCHOOL   (United States)

^c NONE   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ACT; ACUTE STRESS DISORDER; ANXIETY; CULTURAL FACTOR; DEATH; DRIVER; EMPLOYEE; EMPLOYER; EXPERIENCE; FEDERAL EMPLOYERS LIABILITY ACT; GUILT; HEALTH INSURANCE; HELPLESSNESS; HIGH RISK POPULATION; HUMAN; JOB STRESS; LAW; LEGAL LIABILITY; MENTAL HEALTH SERVICE; NEGLIGENCE; OCCUPATIONAL ACCIDENT; OCCUPATIONAL EXPOSURE; POSTTRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER; PSYCHOTRAUMA; RAILWAY; REVIEW; RISK FACTOR; SUICIDE; UNITED STATES;

ACCIDENTS, OCCUPATIONAL; EMPLOYMENT; HUMANS; LIABILITY, LEGAL; MENTAL HEALTH SERVICES; RAILROADS; STRESS DISORDERS, POST-TRAUMATIC; SUICIDE; UNITED STATES;

EID: 33746099693     PISSN: 10936793     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Review

References (41)

1. Abbott R, Young S, Grant G, et al: Railway Suicide: an Investigation of Individual and Organizational Consequences. A report of the SOVRN (Suicides and Open Verdicts on the Railway Network) Project. Doncaster, UK: Doncaster and South Humber Healthcare NHS Trust, 2003
2. Hilkevitch J: When death rides the rails: lifting the veil on a silent public safety crisis-Metra's grim toll of roadbed fatalities. Chicago Tribune Magazine, July 4, 2004, pp 14-29
3. Cohen N: Engineers cope with unintentional train fatalities. National Public Radio, "All Things Considered," broadcast on April 27, 2005
4. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, Text Revision (DSM-IV-TR). Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Association, 2000. ASD becomes PTSD after one month. PTSD can also be "delayed" (beginning six months or more after the event).
5. An English research group has been especially interested in how communities are affected by train wrecks, including their coping strategies and reintegration. See, for example: Chung MC, Werrett J, Easthope Y, et al: Traumatic stress and death anxiety among community residents exposed to a train crash. Omega 45:133-47, 2002;
6. Chung MC, Easthope, Farmer S, et al: Psychological sequelae: post-traumatic stress reactions and personality factors among community residents as secondary victims. Scand J Caring Sci 17:265-70, 2003;
7. Chung MC, Farmer S, Werrett J, et al: Traumatic stress and ways of coping of community residents exposed to a train disaster. Aust NZ J Psychiatry 35:528-34, 2001;
8. and Chung MC, Werrett J, Farmer S, et al: Responses to traumatic stress among community residents exposed to a train collision. Stress Med 16:17-25, 2000
9. Ladwig KH, Baumert JJ: Patterns of suicidal behaviour in a metro subway system: a study of 306 cases injured by the Munich subway, 1980-1999. Eur J Public Health 14:291-5, 2004
10. Kerkhof A: Railway suicide: who is responsible? Crisis 24:47-8, 2003
11. Malt UF, Karlehagen S, Hoff H, et al: The effect of major railway accidents on the psychological health of train drivers: I. Acute psychological responses to accident. J Psychosomat Res 37:793-805, 1993
12. Karlehagen S, Malt UF, Hoff H, et al: The effect of major railway accidents on the psychological health of train drivers: II. A longitudinal study of the one-year outcome after the accident. J Psychosomat Res 37:807-17, 1993
13. Vatshelle A, Moen BE: Serious on-the-track accidents experienced by train drivers: psychological reactions and long-term health effects. J Psychosom Res 42:43-52, 1997
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18. Theorell T, Leymann H, Jodko M, et al: "Person under train" incidents from the subway driver's point of view: a prospective 1-year follow-up study-the design, and medical and psychiatric data. Soc Sci Med 38:471-5, 1994
19. Rautji R, Dogra TD: Rail traffic accidents: a retrospective study. Med Sci Law 44:67-70, 2004
20. Williams C, Miller J, Watson G, et al: A strategy for trauma debriefing after railway suicides. Soc Sci Med 38:483-7, 1994
21. Tang G: Psychotherapy for train drivers after railway suicide. Soc Sci Med 38:477-8, 1994
22. 35 Stat. 65, as amended, 36 Stat. 291, 53 Stat. 1404, Federal Employers' Liability Act (FELA), 45 U.S.C. § 51 et seq (1908). The relevant paragraph in § 51 reads: "Every common carrier by railroad while engaging in commerce between any of the several States or Territories, or between any of the States and Territories, or between the District of Columbia and any of the States or Territories, or between the District of Columbia or any of the States or Territories and any foreign nation or nations, shall be liable in damages to any person suffering injury while he is employed by such carrier in such commerce, or, in case of the death of such employee, to his or her personal representative, for the benefit of the surviving widow or husband and children of such employee; and, if none, then of such employee's parents; and, if none, then of the next of kin dependent upon such employee, for such injury or death resulting in whole or in part from the negligence of any of the officers, agents, or employees of such carrier, or by reason of any defect or insufficiency, due to its negligence, in its cars, engines, appliances, machinery, track, roadbed, works, boats, wharves, or other equipment."
23. An early account of the carnage involved in railway disasters was recounted in Mittelmann M: Dr. Gurdon Wadsworth Russell's account of the 1853 railroad accident at Norwalk, Connecticut. Conn Med 64:291-97, 2000. In this event, a passenger train fell through an open drawbridge. A passenger, Dr. Russell, noted that the engineer jumped off safely before the plunge. His account did not mention whether the engineer experienced trauma or "survivor guilt."
24. Stacey M: Terror of trains. Am Heritage 54:35-9, 2003
25. Cohen ML, Quintner JL: The derailment of railway spine: a timely lesson for post-traumatic fibromyalgia syndrome. Pain Rev 3:181-202, 1996. The authors reexamine railway spine and the nosologic confusion caused by the blurring of boundaries between traumatic injuries and psychogenic conditions.
26. Lamprecht F, Sack M: Posttraumatic stress disorder revisited. Psychosomat Med 64:222-37, 2002
27. Mendelson D: English medical experts and the claims for shock occasioned by railway collisions in the 1860s: issues of law, ethics, and medicine. Int J Law Psychiatry 25:303-29, 2002
28. Federal Aviation Administration Office of Employee Relations and Benefits, AHL-100: Supervisor's guide to workers' compensation claims, May 2001. Available at www.faa.gov/ahr/super/owc/supgud.cfm. Accessed April 17, 2005
29. Federal Employees' Compensation Act, 5 U.S. Code, §§8101-8193 (1993). This is a no-fault workers' compensation program; railroad workers are not covered.
30. Rogers v. Missouri Pacific Railroad Co., 352 U.S. 500 (1957)
31. Gallick v. Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Co., 372 U.S. 108 (1963)
32. Gottshall v. Consolidated Rail Corp., 988 F.2d 355 (3rd Cir. 1993)
33. Carlisle v. Consolidated Rail Corp., 990 F.2d 90 (3rd Cir. 1993)
34. Consolidated Rail Corp. v. Gottshall, 512 U.S. 532 (1994)
35. Consolidated Rail Corp. v. Gottshall (U.S.S.Ct. Transcript), 1994 WL 663409 (1994)
36. 45 U.S.C. §§ 53-54 (1908)
37. Illinois Central Railroad Co. v. Gandy, 750 So.2d 527 (Miss. 1999)
38. Metro-North Commuter Railroad Co. v. Buckley, 521 U.S. 424 (1997)
39. Gottshall, supra, at 558: "I write separately to make explicit . . .the Court's duty. . .to develop a federal common law of negligence under FELA, informed by reference to the evolving common law. See Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad Co. v. Buell, 480 U.S 557, 568-70 (1987)." He continued, at 559, citing the Court's decision in Kernan v. American Dredging Co., 355 U.S. 426, 432 (1958): "Instead of a detailed statute codifying common-law principles, Congress saw fit to enact a statute of the most general terms, thus leaving in large measure to the courts the duty of fashioning remedies for injured employees in a manner analogous to the development of tort remedies at common law. But it is clear that the general congressional intent was to provide liberal recovery for injured workers. . . .and it is also clear that congress intended the creation of no static remedy, but one which would be developed and enlarged [emphasis added] to meet changing conditions and changing concepts of industry's duty toward its workers." Justice Sourer concluded in Gottshall at 559 at that "the Court's decision today [is] a faithful exercise of that duty. . .and. . .adoption of the zone of danger test is well within the discretion left to federal courts under FELA. . . ."
40. Bloom v. Consolidated Rail Corp., 41 F.3d 911 (3rd Cir. 1994)
41. Norfolk & Western Railway Co. v. Ayers, 538 U.S. 135 (2003)