The Volunteer's Needs and Preparedness in Assisting Natural Disaster Victims

The following commentary is an appendix to the Commentary: Disaster Preparedness and Pediatrics: What’s Next? The Youngest Victims: Disaster Preparedness to Meet Children’s Needs

Barriers to Disaster Preparedness among Medical Special Needs Populations

A medical special needs (MSN) assessment was conducted among 3088 respondents in a hurricane prone area. The sample was female (51.7%), Hispanic (92.9%), aged >45 years (51%), not insured for health (59.2%), and with an MSN (33.2%). Barriers to preparedness were characterized for all households, including those with inhabitants reporting MSN ranging from level 0 (mild) to level 4 (most severe)....

Disaster preparedness.

The pediatrician and disaster preparedness.

For decades, emergency planning for natural disasters, public health emergencies, workplace accidents, and other calamities has been the responsibility of government agencies on all levels and certain nongovernment organizations such as the American Red Cross. In the case of terrorism, however, entirely new approaches to emergency planning are under development for a variety of reasons. Terrori...

Acute posttraumatic stress disorder in victims of a natural disaster.

Five months after a tornado devastated a rural community in eastern North Carolina, the authors surveyed the mental health status of 116 disaster victims, using the Hopkins Symptom Checklist (HSCL) expanded to include most of DSM-III criteria for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). A total of 69 (59%) victims met the criteria for acute PTSD, 19 of whom had a severe form. Although an inadequat...