Back to Annual Meeting Page		American Public Health Association 133rd Annual Meeting & Exposition December 10-14, 2005 Philadelphia, PA

Abstract #114962

Janel Alberts, PhD¹, Curtis Condon, PhD¹, and Annette Mugrditchian, LCSW². (1) Quality Management - Research, Orange County Health Care Agency, 405 West 5th Street, Suite 458, Santa Ana, CA 92701, 714-834-2557, jalberts@ochca.com, (2) Adult Mental Health Services, Orange County Health Care Agency, 405 W. 5th Street, Rm. 549, Santa Ana, CA 92701

A survey of mental health staff in Orange County, California was conducted to assess bioterrorism (BT) and disaster-related knowledge and skills, desire for training, comfort in responding to disasters, and barriers to assisting with disaster response. Respondents (N=1,062) included local mental health department staff and personnel who work for agencies that contract with the county mental health department. More than 70% of respondents believed they were knowledgeable in Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and stress prevention/management, and 80% or more said they were proficient in active listening skills, basic interviewing, and establishing rapport. The more knowledgeable or skillful respondents believed they were in disaster-related topics, the more comfortable they said they would be responding to others' mental health needs during a disaster. The greatest training priorities identified were critical incident stress debriefing, risk communication, treating victims of mass trauma, psychological triage, telephone triage, grief counseling, and understanding disaster reactions of relief workers, ethnic minorities, and chronically mentally ill. Family obligation, including ensuring family safety, was the most common reason cited for not being able to respond as a disaster worker within two hours. Likely contributing to this barrier is the fact that 55% of all respondents had not developed a family disaster plan. Additional training for first responders and mental health personnel will improve their knowledge and increase their comfort in responding to disasters. Furthermore, encouraging disaster response workers to develop a family disaster plan may help them respond more quickly and effectively in the event of a disaster or bioterrorism incident.

Learning Objectives: Upon completion of this session, participants will be able to

• Evaluate the current level of bioterrorism preparedness of mental health professionals;
• Identify the bioterrorism training priorities of mental health professionals;
• Identify the benefits of training disaster response workers in disaster mental health and bioterrorism topics;
• Apply quantitative measures to identifying training needs and deficiencies in bioterrorism preparedness.

Keywords: Bioterrorism, Mental Health

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

I wish to disclose that I have NO financial interests or other relationship with the manufactures of commercial products, suppliers of commercial services or commercial supporters.

Recorded presentation