Disaster medicine and public health preparedness
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We review aspects of the recently released National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine report A National Trauma Care System: Integrating Military and Civilian Trauma Systems to Achieve Zero Preventable Deaths After Injury most relevant to disaster health, particularly the concepts of focused empiricism and building a learning health system. The article references battlefield success utilizing these concepts and the emerging Disaster Research Response Program. We call upon disaster health researchers to apply the report's recommendations to their work. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2017;11:510-511).
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Disaster Med Public Health Prep · Aug 2017
Utilizing a Pediatric Disaster Coalition Model to Increase Pediatric Critical Care Surge Capacity in New York City.
A mass casualty event can result in an overwhelming number of critically injured pediatric victims that exceeds the available capacity of pediatric critical care (PCC) units, both locally and regionally. To address these gaps, the New York City (NYC) Pediatric Disaster Coalition (PDC) was established. The PDC includes experts in emergency preparedness, critical care, surgery, and emergency medicine from 18 of 25 major NYC PCC-capable hospitals. ⋯ The purpose of this article was to demonstrate the need for planning for disasters involving children and to provide a stepwise, replicable model for establishing a PDC, with one of its primary goals focused on facilitating PCC surge planning. The process we describe for developing a PDC can be replicated to communities of any size, setting, or location. We offer our model as an example for other cities. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2017;11:473-478).
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Disaster Med Public Health Prep · Aug 2017
Defining Roles for Pharmacy Personnel in Disaster Response and Emergency Preparedness.
Ongoing provision of pharmaceuticals and medical supplies is of key importance during and following a disaster or other emergency event. An effectively coordinated response involving locally available pharmacy personnel-drawing upon the efforts of licensed pharmacists and unlicensed support staff-can help to mitigate harms and alleviate hardship in a community after emergency events. However, pharmacists and their counterparts generally receive limited training in disaster medicine and emergency preparedness as part of their initial qualifications, even in countries with well-developed professional education programs. ⋯ To facilitate future work between pharmacy personnel on an international level, our team undertook an extensive review of the published literature describing pharmacists' experiences in responding to or preparing for both natural and manmade disasters. In addition to identifying key activities that must be performed, we have developed a classification scheme for pharmacy personnel. We believe that this framework will enable pharmacy personnel working in diverse practice settings to identify and undertake essential actions that are necessary to ensure an effective emergency response and will promote better collaboration between pharmacy team members during actual disaster situations. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2017;11:496-504).
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Disaster Med Public Health Prep · Aug 2017
Proposing a Framework for Mobile Applications in Disaster Health Learning.
Mobile applications, or apps, have gained widespread use with the advent of modern smartphone technologies. Previous research has been conducted in the use of mobile devices for learning. However, there is decidedly less research into the use of mobile apps for health learning (eg, patient self-monitoring, medical student learning). ⋯ This resulted in 107 nonduplicative articles, which underwent a 3-phase review, culminating in a final selection of 17 articles. While several learning models were identified, none were sufficient as an app learning framework for the field. Therefore, we propose a learning framework to inform the use of mobile apps in disaster health learning. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2017;11:487-495).