Emergency Preparedness Law and Willingness to Respond in the EMS Workforce

2014 ◽  
Vol 29 (4) ◽  
pp. 358-363 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lainie Rutkow ◽  
Jon S. Vernick ◽  
Carol B. Thompson ◽  
Ronald G. Pirrallo ◽  
Daniel J. Barnett
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Emergency Preparedness ◽  
Influenza Pandemic ◽  
State Level ◽  
National Registry ◽  
Public Health Emergency ◽  
Emergency Plan ◽  
Publication Type ◽  
Emergency Medical ◽  
The Government

AbstractIntroductionFor effective responses to emergencies, individuals must have the ability to respond and also be willing to participate in the response. A growing body of research points to gaps in response willingness among several occupational cohorts with response duties, including the Emergency Medical Services (EMS) workforce. Willingness to respond is particularly important during an influenza or other pandemic, due to increased demands on EMS workers and the potential for workforces to be depleted if responders contract influenza or stay home to care for sick dependents. State emergency preparedness laws are one possible avenue to improve willingness to respond.HypothesisPresence of certain state-level emergency preparedness laws (ie, ability to declare a public health emergency; requirement to create a public health emergency plan; priority access to health resources for responders) is associated with willingness to respond among EMS workers.MethodsFour hundred twenty-one EMS workers from the National Registry of Emergency Medical Technicians’ (NREMT's) mid-year Longitudinal EMT Attributes and Demographics Study (LEADS) were studied. The survey, which included questions about willingness to respond during an influenza pandemic, was fielded from May through June 2009. Survey data were merged with data about the presence or absence of the three emergency preparedness laws of interest in each of the 50 US states. Unadjusted logistic regression analyses were performed with the presence/absence of each law and were adjusted for respondents’ demographic/locale characteristics.ResultsCompared to EMS workers in states that did not allow the government to declare a public health emergency, those in states that permitted such declarations were more likely to report that they were willing to respond during an influenza pandemic. In adjusted and unadjusted analyses, this difference was not statistically significant. Similar results were found for the other state-level emergency preparedness laws of interest.ConclusionWhile state-level emergency preparedness laws are not associated with willingness to respond, recent research suggests that inconsistencies between the perceived and objective legal environments for EMS workers could be an alternative explanation for this study's findings. Educational efforts within the EMS workforce and more prominent state-level implementation of emergency preparedness laws should be considered as a means to raise awareness of these laws. These types of actions are important steps toward determining whether state-level emergency preparedness laws have the potential to promote response willingness among EMS workers.RutkowL, VernickJS, ThompsonCB, PirralloRG, BarnettDJ. Emergency preparedness law and willingness to respond in the EMS workforce. Prehosp Disaster Med. 2014;29(4):1-6.

The Public Health Workforce and Willingness to Respond to Emergencies: A 50-State Analysis of Potentially Influential Laws

2014 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 64-71 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lainie Rutkow ◽  
Jon S. Vernick ◽  
Maxim Gakh ◽  
Jennifer Siegel ◽  
Carol B. Thompson ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Emergency Preparedness ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Population Level ◽  
The United States ◽  
Public Health Emergency ◽  
Public Health Workforce ◽  
Federal State ◽  
State And Local ◽  
The Government

Law plays a critical role in all stages of a public health emergency, including planning, response, and recovery. Public health emergencies introduce health concerns at the population level through, for example, the emergence of a novel infectious disease. In the United States, at the federal, state, and local levels, laws provide an infrastructure for public health emergency preparedness and response efforts: they grant the government the ability to officially declare an emergency, authorize responders to act, and facilitate interjurisdictional coordination. Law is perhaps most visible during an emergency when the president or a state's governor issues a disaster declaration establishing the temporal and geographic parameters for the response and making financial and other resources available. This legal authority has increasingly been used during the last decade.

scholarly journals Methodology of emergency medical logistics for multiple epidemic areas in public health emergency

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (7) ◽  
pp. e0253978
Author(s):  
Chunxia Hou ◽  
Huiyuan Jiang
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Programming Model ◽  
Public Health Emergency ◽  
Distribution Model ◽  
Emergency Relief ◽  
Total Cost ◽  
Emergency Medical ◽  
Dynamic Stochastic ◽  
The Government ◽  
Medical Relief

Coronavirus disease 2019(COVID-19) has brought great disasters to humanity, and its influence continues to intensify. In response to the public health emergencies, prompt relief supplies are key to reduce the damage. This paper presents a method of emergency medical logistics to quick response to emergency epidemics. The methodology includes two recursive mechanisms: (1) the time-varying forecasting of medical relief demand according to a modified susceptible-exposed-infected- Asymptomatic- recovered (SEIAR) epidemic diffusion model, (2) the relief supplies distribution based on a multi-objective dynamic stochastic programming model. Specially, the distribution model addresses a hypothetical network of emergency medical logistics with considering emergency medical reserve centers (EMRCs), epidemic areas and e-commerce warehousing centers as the rescue points. Numerical studies are conducted. The results show that with the cooperation of different epidemic areas and e-commerce warehousing centers, the total cost is 6% lower than without considering cooperation of different epidemic areas, and 9.7% lower than without considering cooperation of e-commerce warehousing centers. Particularly, the total cost is 20% lower than without considering any cooperation. This study demonstrates the importance of cooperation in epidemic prevention, and provides the government with a new idea of emergency relief supplies dispatching, that the rescue efficiency can be improved by mutual rescue between epidemic areas in public health emergency.

scholarly journals 18.H. Workshop: Bringing evidence during public health emergencies: addressing the challenge through HTA

2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (Supplement_5) ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Emergency Preparedness ◽  
Public Health Emergency ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Public Health Emergencies ◽  
Response Planning ◽  
Emergency Preparedness And Response ◽  
Public Health Emergency Preparedness

Abstract Evidence-based decision-making is central to public health. Implementing evidence-informed actions is most challenging during a public health emergency as in an epidemic, when time is limited, scientific uncertainties and political pressures tend to be high, and irrefutable evidence may be lacking. The process of including evidence in public health decision-making and for evidence-informed policy, in preparation, and during public health emergencies, is not systematic and is complicated by many barriers as the absences of shared tools and approaches for evidence-based preparedness and response planning. Many of today's public health crises are also cross-border, and countries need to collaborate in a systematic and standardized way in order to enhance interoperability and to implement coordinated evidence-based response plans. To strengthen the impact of scientific evidence on decision-making for public health emergency preparedness and response, it is necessary to better define mechanisms through which interdisciplinary evidence feeds into decision-making processes during public health emergencies and the context in which these mechanisms operate. As a multidisciplinary, standardized and evidence-based decision-making tool, Health Technology Assessment (HTA) represents and approach that can inform public health emergency preparedness and response planning processes; it can also provide meaningful insights on existing preparedness structures, working as bridge between scientists and decision-makers, easing knowledge transition and translation to ensure that evidence is effectively integrated into decision-making contexts. HTA can address the link between scientific evidence and decision-making in public health emergencies, and overcome the key challenges faced by public health experts when advising decision makers, including strengthening and accelerating knowledge transfer through rapid HTA, improving networking between actors and disciplines. It may allow a 360° perspective, providing a comprehensive view to decision-making in preparation and during public health emergencies. The objective of the workshop is to explore and present how HTA can be used as a shared and systematic evidence-based tool for Public Health Emergency Preparedness and Response, in order to enable stakeholders and decision makers taking actions based on the best available evidence through a process which is systematic and transparent. Key messages There are many barriers and no shared mechanisms to bring evidence in decision-making during public health emergencies. HTA can represent the tool to bring evidence-informed actions in public health emergency preparedness and response.

scholarly journals From Anthrax to Zika: Fifteen Years of Public Health Emergency Preparedness

2017 ◽  
Vol 107 (S2) ◽  
pp. S117-S117 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rachel Nonkin Avchen ◽  
Tanya Telfair LeBlanc ◽  
Christine Kosmos
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Emergency Preparedness ◽  
Public Health Emergency ◽  
Public Health Emergency Preparedness

Long-Term Capacity-Building in Public Health Emergency Preparedness in Thailand – Short Report

2007 ◽  
Vol 19 (1_suppl) ◽  
pp. 13-17 ◽  
Author(s):  
K Limpakarnjanarat ◽  
Rw Linkins ◽  
E Emerson ◽  
WL Aldis ◽  
C Jiraphongsa ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Capacity Building ◽  
Emergency Preparedness ◽  
Public Health Emergency ◽  
Short Report ◽  
Public Health Emergency Preparedness

Altered Standards of Care During an Influenza Pandemic: Identifying Ethical, Legal, and Practical Principles to Guide Decision Making

2009 ◽  
Vol 3 (S2) ◽  
pp. S132-S140 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donna Levin ◽  
Rebecca Orfaly Cadigan ◽  
Paul D. Biddinger ◽  
Suzanne Condon ◽  
Howard K. Koh ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Planning Process ◽  
Influenza Pandemic ◽  
State Level ◽  
Mass Casualty ◽  
Standards Of Care ◽  
Public Health Preparedness ◽  
Community Stakeholders ◽  
Mass Casualty Events ◽  
Public Health Officials

ABSTRACTAlthough widespread support favors prospective planning for altered standards of care during mass casualty events, the literature includes few, if any, accounts of groups that have formally addressed the overarching policy considerations at the state level. We describe the planning process undertaken by public health officials in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, along with community and academic partners, to explore the issues surrounding altered standards of care in the event of pandemic influenza. Throughout 2006, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health and the Harvard School of Public Health Center for Public Health Preparedness jointly convened a working group comprising ethicists, lawyers, clinicians, and local and state public health officials to consider issues such as allocation of antiviral medications, prioritization of critical care, and state seizure of private assets. Community stakeholders were also engaged in the process through facilitated discussion of case scenarios focused on these and other issues. The objective of this initiative was to establish a framework and some fundamental principles that would subsequently guide the process of establishing specific altered standards of care protocols. The group collectively identified 4 goals and 7 principles to guide the equitable allocation of limited resources and establishment of altered standards of care protocols. Reviewing and analyzing this process to date may serve as a resource for other states. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2009;3(Suppl 2):S132–S140)

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document