OBJECTIVES A cross-sectional investigation was designed to assess the quality of local government plans for public health emergencies and to determine whether relevant regulations for emergency plans are in place. METHODS Sixty-six municipalities were selected randomly using stratified sampling, and a questionnaire investigation on emergency plans was conducted in these municipalities. RESU...

The preparation of high quality emergency plans to guide operational decisions is an approach to mitigate the emergency management complexity. In such multidisciplinary scenario, teams with different perspectives need to collaborate towards a common goal and interact within a common understanding. In this scenario, the characterization of the variability of the elements involved in these plans ...

In the event of a disaster in Germany a so-called executive staff is set up. In support of their work they refer to emergency plans, which describe the chronological order of a set of suitable measures for a dedicated event e.g. an evacuation. These plans only exist in the form of large printed documents. Hence, the technical support for executing emergency plans is very limited. In this paper ...

When a person’s heart or breathing stops and the cause is reversible, immediate cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) offers a chance of life. However, when a person is dying—for example, from organ failure, frailty, or advanced cancer—and his or her heart stops as a final part of a dying process, CPR will not prevent death and may do harm. “Do not attempt CPR” (DNACPR) decisions were first docum...

Natural or human made disasters have a significant negative impact on the environment. At the same time there is an extensive effort to support management and decision making in emergency situations by information technologies. Therefore the purpose of the paper is to propose a design patterns applicable in emergency management, enabling better analysis and design of emergency management proces...

BACKGROUND Federal, provincial and municipal leaders in Canada have adopted a culture of preparedness with the development and update of emergency plans in anticipation of different types of disasters. As evident during the 2003 global outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), it is important to provide support for health care workers (HCWs) who are vulnerable during infectious outb...