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APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Nancie S. Bendaņa, MS, RN, Sharon Trucker, RN, MS, and Jose Escobar, RN, MSN. Public Health Nursing Administration, Los Angeles County Department of Health Services, 241 N. Figueroa Street , Suite 347, Los Angeles, CA 90012, 213-240-8089, nbendana@ladhs.org

Early in September 2005, Los Angeles County (LAC) Public Health (PH) was notified that the County could be receiving up to 2,000 evacuees from Hurricane Katrina. PH was asked to recruit RNs to staff a Medical Screening Clinic at a proposed Evacuee Reception Center and eight proposed American Red Cross (ARC) sponsored shelters. A website to register RN paid volunteers was created; 150/700 (~21%) PH RNs registered within a two-week period and 100+ RNs participated in one of two Disaster Health Services trainings provided by the regional ARC office. Shortly thereafter, LAC received word that the Federal Emergency Management Agency sponsored evacuees would not be coming to LAC. However, the training of PH RNs in Disaster Health Service proved fortuitous as the regional ARC chapter service center soon became inundated with Katrina evacuees who had arrived on their own or through sponsors. Since most of the local ARC nurses had been deployed out of state, the regional ARC chapter requested PH nursing assistance in staffing the service center. Between September 22 and October 13, 2005, a total of 41 PH RNs were deployed to the service center. A week after the service center deployments began, a local wild fire erupted and two shelters were set up for evacuees. Again, the regional ARC chapter asked for PH nursing assistance, this time to staff the shelters; a total of 12 public health nurses were deployed over a three-day period. A post-event debriefing of PH RNs deployed to both the ARC Service Center and shelters was conducted utilizing a brief Likert Scale questionnaire. This presentation will highlight the results of the post-event debriefing and outline specific recommendations pertaining to PH nursing's role in disasters and implications for emergency preparedness planning.

Learning Objectives: At the conclusion of the session the participants for this session will be able to

• Describe three roles public health nurses may be asked to perform in a natural disaster.
• List three debriefing questions that can be utilized to quickly evaluate public health nursing personnel's deployment experience in response to a natural disaster.
• List three skills public health nurses should be proficient in to effectively respond to a natural disaster.

Keywords: Disasters, Public Health Nursing

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Not Answered