Environmental stressors and organizational inefficiencies: A critical analysis of emergency medical technicians in Inchoen, South Korea

Abstract

As society changes and people's lifestyles change, various emergency dispatches are increasing year after year. Accordingly, there must be an appropriate number of Emergency Medical Technicians (EMTs) and ambulances to meet the growing demand for emergency calls. This study was conducted to find out how EMTs, who deal with the gradual increase in the number of EMS dispatches, think of organizational efficiency.

This study conducted in-depth interviews on occupational stress and organizational inefficiency with EMTs belonging to the Incheon Fire Department in South Korea, and identified organizational problems. After reviewing related secondary data through a preliminary literature review, a total of 30 samples were recruited, and data were collected and analyzed using open-ended semi-structured qualitative interviews.

In order to conduct a full-fledged qualitative research analysis, 24 phone call recording interviews and six written interviews were transcribed and translated from Korean to English. For qualitative research analysis, ATLAS.ti specialized software was used based on grounded theory. The analysis method went through the process of dividing and summarizing the corpus of extensive data into core categories through open coding, axial coding, and selective coding. Through repetitive analysis and revision work, three themes, eight categories, and 24 codes were formed. Critical common stress factors, administrative inefficiencies, administrative policies, and practical policies were formed as major categories to discuss in-depth ways to improve the problems that EMTs thought about and experienced during their daily work.