Role of Public Health Nurse during National Disaster



[Name of the institute]

Role of Public Health Nurse during National Disaster

Western Governors University

According to International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, disasters are sudden, calamitous events that seriously disrupts the functioning of a community or society and causes human, material, and economic or environmental losses that exceed the community's or society's ability to cope using its own resources. Disasters are two types: natural and manmade. earthquakes, floods, landslides are natural disasters, while war, bomb blasts and chemical leaks are manmade (n.d). Since decades, nurses have been an integral part of disaster management, and they still continue to expand its scope. On the other hand, public health nursing knowledge could and must be employed throughout each stage of the disaster cycle: prevention, preparation, response, and recovery (Association of State and Territorial Directors of Nursing, 2002).

Role of Public Health Personnel including Public Health Nurse during disaster

The goal of disaster medical response planners is to assign personnel to roles that are as familiar as possible and to simultaneously enhance flexibility of response to extra ordinary circumstances. In the given Franklin County simulation by University of Minnesota (2006), the Public Health Director is the head of the community health team. In the simulation, his first task was to attend an Incident Debriefing with the Incident Commander and other members of the relief team. The Incident Commander (in this case, the fire chief) broke down what they knew to be the immediate threats to the public and what efforts were being made to clean up. Power outages, toxic events, road obstructions, flooding, and a contaminated water supply were all top priorities in the initial assessment. Given this information the Public Health Director was able to suggest his opinion on what health and medical concerns he had and what actions he was going to take immediately to address these issues. His priority actions were to assess the needs of the special populations, make a public service announcement for safe food and water handling to be written and distributed, and to obtain a vendor list for sanitation purposes (port-a-potties). After the meeting, the Director saw that he would need an incident command system particularly for Public Health issues.

The following persons were included in the Incident Command System: Operation Chief, Planning Section Chief, Liaison Officer, Logistic chief, Public Information Officer, and Financial/Administrative chief. Operation Chief had supervisory role on organizing and assigning the field resources, while Planning Chief was planning and managing the action plan. As Liaison Officer had good relations with communities and different organizations, he/she was trying to meet millions of request from agencies and people. Logistic chief was helping for collecting and making available the necessary things for the successful operations. Public Information Officer had to provide correct information to the public and collaborating agencies. Financial problems were under the responsibility of Financial/Administrative chief (University of Minnesota, 2006).

A nurse may be involved in several roles during a disaster. In the given simulation in Franklin County, the ...