In minor to moderate natural and man-made disasters, such as earthquakes and fires, people may be trapped inside buildings and hurt by the disaster. Considering that trapped victims may be unconscious, there is a high demand by emergency responders to get information on the locations and physical statuses of trapped victims inside a building during a disaster. In this paper, a smartphone-based,...

Disasters test civil administrations' and health services' capacity to act in a flexible but well-coordinated manner because each disaster is unique and poses unusual challenges. The health services required differ markedly according to the nature of the disaster and the geographical spread of those affected. Epidemiology has shown that services need to be equipped to deal with major depressive...

When a disaster hits a wide area, communication services for public use will be rendered unavailable. This will make it difficult to confirm the safety of people in the disaster area. A solution to this problem is to form delay/disruption tolerant networks (DTN) using mobile terminals of victims, those of rescuers, who serve as information carriers, and terminals (servers) in shelters. In this ...

BACKGROUND Health care management in disasters is one of the main parts of disaster management. Health in disasters is affected by performance of various sectors, and has an interactive impact on various aspects of disaster management. The aim of this study was to identify the most important themes affecting the healthcare management in disaster. METHOD In this qualitative study with a conten...

BACKGROUND In 1992, a cargo aircraft crashed into apartment buildings in Amsterdam, killing 43 victims and destroying 266 apartments. In the aftermath there were speculations about the cause of the crash, potential exposures to hazardous materials due to the disaster and the health consequences. Starting in 2000, the Epidemiological Study Air Disaster in Amsterdam (ESADA) aimed to assess the lo...

Immediately after the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, the Internet was flooded by a huge amount of information concerning the damage and problems caused by the earthquake, the tsunami, and the nuclear disaster. Many reports about aid efforts and advice to victims were also transmitted into cyberspace. However, since most people were overwhelmed by the massive amounts of information, they coul...

This paper describes the international disaster victim identification (DVI) response mounted in Thailand, with particular reference to Singapore's contribution to this process, in the wake of the Asian tsunami of 26 December, 2004, which devastated parts of more than 10 countries in and around the Indian Ocean and claimed more than 200,000 lives. Although Singapore was unscathed by this natural...

Pediatric disaster preparedness implies that systems are in place to ensure the rapid triage and emergency management of children as patients in a natural, manmade, or terrorist-initiated disaster. Children are a vulnerable population for a number of reasons that include anatomic, physiologic, immunologic, developmental and psychologic issues that are important for planning for the care of chil...

We assessed how point-of-care testing (POCT), diagnostic testing at or near the site of patient care, can optimize diagnosis, triage, and patient monitoring during disasters. We surveyed 4 primary care units (PCUs) and 10 hospitals in provinces hit hardest by the tsunami in Thailand and 22 hospitals in Katrina-affected areas. We assessed POCT, critical care testing, critical values notification...

On 8th October 2005 an Earthquake measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale struck Azad Jammu and Kashmir and the Northern Areas of Pakistan. The psychosocial consequences were in no way less than the massive loss of lives and property and the physical injuries and maladies that followed the disaster. A large number of health carers from across the country and around the world converged to undertake t...