Citation

Klein KR, Pepe PE, Burkle FM, Nagel NE, Swienton RE. Disaster Med. Public Health Prep. 2008; 2(1): S40-4.

Affiliation

Section of EMS, Homeland Security and Disaster Medicine, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX 75390-8890, USA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2008, Society for Disaster Medicine and Public Health, Publisher Cambridge University Press)

DOI

10.1097/DMP.0b013e3181734eb6

PMID

18769266

Abstract

In many countries, traditional medical planning for disasters developed largely in response to battlefield and multiple casualty incidents, generally involving corporal injuries. The mass evacuation of a metropolitan population in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina evolved into life-and-death triage scenarios involving thousands of patients with nontraumatic illnesses and special medical needs. Although unprecedented in the United States, triage management needs for this disaster were similar to other large-scale public health emergencies, both natural and human-generated, that occurred globally in the past half-century. The need for alternative triage-management processes similar to the methodologies of other global mass public health emergencies is illustrated through the experience of disaster medical assistance teams in the first 3 days following Katrina's landfall. The immediate establishment of disaster-specific, consensus-based, public health emergency-related triage protocols-developed with ethical and legal expertise and a renewed focus on multidimensional, multifactorial matrix decision-making processes-is strongly recommended.

Language: en