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At least 883 records · Page 49Linked to original sources
PubMed1991

The St Croix disaster and the National Disaster Medical System.

The National Disaster Medical System was designed to respond to a catastrophic disaster by creating a group of specially trained civilian disaster medical assistance teams. The teams would be transported to the periphery of the event to triage, stabilize, and then prepare victims for evacuation to facilities elsewhere in the United States that have agreed in advance to accept such patients. Hurricane Hugo's devastation in St Croix offered the first opportunity to test the system. The event was an example of a type of medical disaster that resulted in a sudden reduction in medical resources without a great increase in casualties. Background information and operation of the New Mexico disaster medical assistance team are presented with a clinical profile of the patients seen during the disaster. We describe the first actual deployment of a disaster medical assistance team and the issues that must be addressed before future deployments.

Disaster Planning↗
PubMed1986

A prehospital approach to multiple-victim incidents.

Although most prehospital systems have well-developed protocols for single-victim rescues and mass casualties, multiple-victim incidents falling between the two in scope have not been analyzed in detail. Forty-one audio tapes of incidents with four or more victims were evaluated for techniques and decisions that affected the runs' speed and efficiency. Common problems both in the field and at the base hospital were identified. Recommendations for management in the field and for paramedic and base station transmissions are given.

Disaster Planning↗
PubMed1995

Outbreak of Escherichia coli O157:H7 hemorrhagic colitis and hemolytic uremic syndrome: effect on use of a pediatric emergency department.

STUDY OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the effect of an outbreak of Escherichia coli O157:H7 colitis, and media coverage of the outbreak, on use of an emergency department. DESIGN: Review of pediatric ED use and charges for gastrointestinal illness during the epidemic and during a control period. SETTING: Pediatric ED in Seattle, Washington. PARTICIPANTS: All children seen in the ED with a gastrointestinal illness during the epidemic period (January and February 1993) and during a control period (January and February 1992). RESULTS: During the epidemic, 31 patients with E coli O157:H7 infection had 45 visits to the ED. The number of visits for gastrointestinal illness not caused by E coli O157:H7 was 103% higher in the epidemic period than in the control period (653 in 1992, 1,327 in 1993). The number of visits was closely associated with the number of newspaper stories about E coli O157:H7 illness (correlation coefficient, .88; P = .002). The increased number of evaluations for gastrointestinal illness not caused by E coli O157:H7 infection during the epidemic period was associated with an additional $101,193 in charges per month compared with the control period. There were no important differences in the evaluation of gastrointestinal illness between 1992 and 1993 except for an increase in the proportion of patients with stool cultures (13.1% versus 26.4%, P < .001). CONCLUSION: For every visit by a patient with E coli O157:H7 infection, there were 15 additional visits (above the baseline from the control period) by patients with other gastrointestinal illness. The true cost of this epidemic included not only the evaluation of patients with disease but also the evaluation of those who presented because they were worried they had the disease. The intensity of media coverage of a disaster may correlate with the number of visits to the ED, and understanding of this fact may help in disaster planning.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2002

Layered neural networks based analysis of radon concentration and environmental parameters in earthquake prediction.

A layered neural network (LNN) has been employed to estimate the radon concentration in soil related to the environmental parameters. This technique can find any functional relationship between the radon concentration and the environmental parameters. Analysis of the data obtained from a site in Thailand indicates that this approach is able to differentiate time variation of radon concentration caused by environmental parameters from those arising by anomaly phenomena in the earth (e.g. earthquake). This method is compared with a linear computational technique based on impulse responses from multivariable time series. It is indicated that the proposed method can give a better estimation of radon variations related to environmental parameters that may have a non-linear effect on the radon concentration in soil, such as rainfall.

Disaster Planning↗
PubMed2002

The impact of the 9-21 earthquake experiences of Taiwanese nurses as rescuers.

The powerful earthquake of September 21, 1999 wrought incalculable havoc on lives and properties in Taiwan. Although the scars of the earthquake can never be erased, the calamity can lead to a more full understanding of the experiences, perceptions and reflections of nurses involved directly in post-rescue situations. The purpose of this study was to compare the impacts of rescue experiences on Taiwanese female and male nurses who worked as rescuers following the earthquake of 21 September. A purposive sample of 46 nurses (40 women, 6 men) (mean age 26) who worked in a renowned hospital with a reputation for high quality of emergency care in Northern Taiwan was obtained. Data were collected by in-depth semi-structured interviews and analyzed by a unique mode of between-method triangulation. The majority of the subjects (38 female, 6 male) reported various impacts from their rescue experiences. They are: (a) recognition of the impermanence of life and wishing to lead a more significant life (32 female, 3 male); (b) more caring relationships with others and for their homeland (19 female, 5 male); (c) a clearer concept of disaster care (19 female, 4 male); (d) a better appreciation of the value of nursing and their own self-worth (11 female, 3 male); (e) enhanced knowledge of the survivors' needs (3 female); and (f) enhanced ability to identify the factors hindering rescue operations (1 female, 2 male). However, one female nurse complained of having been bothered by feelings of fear of earthquake disasters resulting from her rescue experience. Rescue experiences help to strengthen most Taiwanese nurses' professional competency, reinforce their commitment to nursing, and lead them to have positive life goals. The relative weight of the impacts for male and female nurses were somewhat different. The vulnerability of nurses, which was manifested in the post-rescue stage, requires attention and long-term follow-up. A comprehensive and organized pre-rescue training program which recognizes the need to care for both acute and chronic post-disaster conditions, along with spiritual care for the survivors, as well as a "disaster reduction" course for health professionals are suggested.

Adult↗
PubMed2001

Incentives for mitigation investment and more effective risk management: the need for public-private partnerships.

A key question facing both well-developed industrial countries and emerging economies is how to reduce future disaster losses while still providing financial protection to victims from these events. This paper proposes a strategy for the use of cost-effective risk mitigation measures coupled with insurance and/or new capital market instruments to achieve these objectives. The mix of these measures will depend on the governance structure and the institutional arrangements in the particular country. There will always be a need for a combination of policy tools and the interaction among key interested parties from both the private and public sectors in developing a disaster management strategy. Two examples, one from US and the other from Honduras, illustrate differences between strategies that countries can adopt.

Disaster Planning↗
PubMed2001

Chains of damages and failures in a metropolitan environment: some observations on the Kobe earthquake in 1995.

The interaction and the couple effects that may occur as induced and indirect consequences of any triggering hazard in metropolitan areas is one of the most important problems to be tackled during disasters, as the Kobe earthquake in 1995 showed very clearly. The analysis of direct, secondary and indirect effects of the Kobe earthquake suggests to substitute the concept of chain of losses and failures to the simple couple hazardous event-damages which is currently used. Not only parameters related to physical weakness or strength of the built environment should be considered by scientists, experts and decision-makers. Organisational, social, and systemic factors are equally crucial to understand the magnified dimension of disasters at increasing levels of exposed systems vulnerability. Linking failures due to different kinds of vulnerability one to the other permits to reconstruct complete event scenarios, where social and organisational elements are not simply added to the 'hard' components of cities, but contribute to explain why failures and losses occurred and why it took so long to repair them. Lifeline damage assessment provides a good example to show how physical, organisational and systemic vulnerabilities are intimately connected one to the other. The point of view from which governance problems related to prevention and emergency preparedness will be looked at is that of an urban and regional planner. When planners look for design solutions suitable for a specific town or region, they must constantly bridge between hard technical matters and social and economical concerns. Furthermore, they are forced to consider in their projects spatial and geographic dimensions. Those two typical features of planners' approach to problem solving can be interesting for scholars in the field of risk assessment and mitigation research.

Disaster Planning↗
PubMed2003

Estimation of the radon concentration in soil related to the environmental parameters by a modified Adaline neural network.

A new method based on adaptive linear neuron (Adaline) is used to estimate the radon concentration in soil associated with the environmental parameters. Analysis of the data obtained from a site in Thailand indicates that our proposed method is able to differentiate temporal variation of radon concentration related to the environmental parameters from those caused by phenomena in the earth (e.g. earthquake). The result also shows agreement between our method and another method based on impulse responses from multivariable time series (complex mathematical equations).

Disaster Planning↗