Contributions to Disaster Mental Health Services in Massachusetts

Kathryn (Kathy) Dardeck worked and held leadership roles in the Disaster Mental Health Services arena of Massachusetts for several decades. She served as the western Massachusetts Regional Disaster Response Network Coordinator for 9 years, and was recruited from there to serve as the clinical director of the western Massachusetts Emergency Medical Services Critical Incident Stress Management Team. She served emergency medical service workers (primarily firefighters, emergency medical technicians and dispatchers) for many years working with the Massachusetts Department of Fire Services on critical incident stress management teams. Kathryn (Kathy) Dardeck was the state co-chairperson of the Massachusetts Psychological Association’s Disaster Response Network for over a decade and went on to become the chairperson of that committee for another 5 years. During that time she was tapped and appointed to the Massachusetts Governor’s Committee on Disaster Mental Health Services.

After serving with Massachusetts Firefighter Teams at Ground Zero on the rubble of the World Trade Center towers in New York City subsequent to the terrorist attacks there on September 11, 2001, Kathy Dardeck devoted much of her time to training and placing psychologists in disaster response positions around the Massachusetts Commonwealth as well as disaster sites around the country requesting mutual aid from Massachusetts. In 2013 she received the Ezra Saul Psychological Service Award for her work by the Massachusetts Psychological Association.