Italian adaptation of the Coping Responses of Rescue Workers Inventory (CRRWI), a questionnaire witch measures coping strategies utilised by emergency health workers

This study aims to present the Italian version of the "Coping Responses of Rescue Workers Inventory" (CRRWI) developed by Beaton and colleagues (1999) for measuring coping strategies used by emergency workers. Participants to the study also filled in the Los Angeles Symptom Checklist (King et al., 1995), in order to have an independent measure of stress levels related to coping strategies. Two hundreds and eighty-seven health emergency workers participated to the study, 60% voluntary rescuers and 40% professional rescuers; they belonged to a variety of services and infrastructures of extra-hospital first aid. Through factor analysis six coping factors were identified, and differences due to the role during the rescue, years of service and gender were examined. In addition, LASC stress scores were correlated to the coping factors from the CRRWI. Finally, the "Coping Responses of Rescue Workers Inventory" demonstrated good psychometric properties and to be well suited to the Italian emergency health service.