Interesting and significant question. To me, the answer is no; this is based on actual experiences in responding to serious situations involving complete strangers, friends and acquaintances, and family members, especially my oldest daughter. The immediate, visceral response to the immediate situation is identical, and one's training kicks in to render immediate care.

There is a significant difference in the extent and duration of one's involvement to those three categories. With strangers, you involve other components of EMS,and hand off fairly quickly once you have performed your function, which may be quite strenuous and even potentially hazardous. Your emotional involvement is fairly minimal and you resume normality soon.

An example of a close friend situation. We were attending a meeting out of town and he suffered a grand mal seizure, no previous history and quite unexpected. I was there to ride to the ER, provide info,call his wife, but I was back essentially to normal very late that evening about seven hours after the event.

My daughter sustained a depressed skull fracture while we were doing field work at Canyon de Chelly. I was immediately off the project, participated heavily in emergency care, and spent the next week at her bedside in the ICU, alternating with my wife. We got back to normal, kind of, in about three weeks. I remember attending my SAR group's monthly meeting the first evening we returned home. The presentation that night was "Cranial injuries and their care."