Emergency Planning for Pregnant and Birthing Women and their Newborns: The Role of Public Health Nursing Among Community Stakeholders

Background and Issues: Pregnant women and their fetuses, and postpartum women and their newborn babies are at increased risk of illness and death during prolonged disasters such as Hurricane Katrina. Communities across the United States are lacking emergency plans for these vulnerable patient groups. In Minnesota there is an identifiable gap in clinical care for these patient groups, like during an influenza pandemic, where the health care delivery systems will be stretched beyond their ordinary capacity. Pfeiffer discussed this clinical gap in a publication (2008). Description: Later, a clinical teaching tool was developed and its implementation formed the basis for this project. The project conformed to the Federal government's mandate that local communities develop extensive emergency services in case of natural disasters, terrorist attacks, and pandemics like H1N1 influenza. The project was hosted by the Minnesota Visiting Nurse Agency, which is the major public health home nursing provider in Minneapolis. Volunteer nurses recruited from the agency, introduced the teaching tool to 19 women, who qualified for the service, during home visits. The nurses rated the tool easy to use with 68% of the clients. Fifty three percent of clients either owned or could buy the supplies for disaster planning. Those noninterested clients each offered a unique response that presented a barrier to emergency planning for them. Lessons Learned: In conclusion, the nurses emphasized that to be successful in engaging clients, the teaching tool should be linked to a multiagency community plan created in collaboration with stakeholders from hospitals, clinics, public health agencies, and emergency management in the metropolitan region of Minnesota. This project also revealed that public health nurses, motivated by social justice principles, need support in planning and intervening in emergency situations to reduce the inequities of the vulnerable clients they serve. Recommendations: Efforts must be made by multiagency emergency preparedness planning leaders to integrate public health nurses with acute and ambulatory care providers to create an alternative plan of care for these at risk groups.