Background: Disaster response is an emergency nursing responsibility. Responding to disasters, however, is hazardous as terrorism, pandemics and chemical industrial accidents challenge the safety of nurses and their families. International experience has shown that nurses can become victims of disasters and that fear of contaminating family and friends may prevent nurses from attending work or returning home during a disaster response. An understanding of the factors that enable or disable their disaster preparedness will underpin future disaster policy and planning for Australian and international health care organizations. Methods: This study examines the willingness of Australian emergency nurses to attend work to respond to a health care disaster, using a 3-phase mixed-method design. Phase 1 was a national online survey, with 451 responses. Phase 2 involved 6 focus groups at 4 hospital sites, with 41 participants and Phase 3 involved in-depth interviews with emergency nurses at different sites, with 11 participants. This presentation will highlight results from the study on the willingness of Australian emergency nurses to respond to a health care disaster. Results: Preliminary findings indicate that emergency nurses' willingness to respond to health care disasters was dependent on a number of factors, including their out-of-work responsibilities, the changes to their roles and responsibilities at work, their confidence in management and their work team, the information they are given about the disaster, the type of disaster and the degree of risk involved. Conclusions:The contribution the findings this study will make to disaster planning and preparedness for nursing staff, health planners and administrators will be outlined.
Abstracts -17th World Congress on Disaster and Emergency Medicine Prehospital and Disaster MedicineVol. 26, Supplement 1 ( > 50 years of age), and those who had been working in EMS for longer periods were found to have significantly lower scores (p = 0.05). Background: Since its development in the 1970s, the paramedic profession has tried to expend its traditional role of providing prehospital emergency care in ambulances into new fields of practice (e.g. community care). Paramedics in Israel are employed almost exclusively in the emergency medical services (EMS). Similar to other countries, the manpower shortage in the Israeli health system forced policy-makers to consider the expansion of traditional roles of various healthcare professions including paramedics.Objectives: This presentation seeks to: (1) map the current situation and challenges facing paramedics in Israel; (2) examine paramedics' professional status among policy-makers; and (3) examine the best way to integrate paramedics in the Israeli health-system. Methods: Qualitative interviews were conducted with 20 senior policy-makers in the Israeli EMS system, Academia, Health Ministry, and military. A policy analysis of documents, laws, regulations, and public media was conducted. Results:The Ministry of Health in Israel did not play a significant role in the regulation of the profession. Nevertheless, according to the interviewees, paramedics have gained considerable professional recognition among policy-makers, healthcare professionals, and the general public. Following the medical manpower crisis that is evolving in Israel, and the trends that are common in many western countries of expanding the traditional roles of allied health professions, most policy-makers in Israel see the paramedic role evolving into new field of practice. According to policy-makers, legislators, and EMS officials, the major challenges that the paramedic profession faces deal with legislative and professional (mainly academization) issues. Conclusions:The paramedic profession must adapt itself to the new medical environment. More research should be conducted to build a model, adapted for different local national context, to expand the traditional role of paramedics. This will influence training, research and policy-making regarding the paramedic profession, and will change the traditional professional medical borders.
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