Disaster Nursing Literature Review

Question: Discuss about theDisaster Nursingfor Literature Review. Answer: Introduction: Each and every nation in the world is prone to both natural and manmade disaster, which may make the lives of a large number of people at risk. Therefore, it is the duty of the nurses to take the responsibility of saving them if they are injured during these times. However, this has not been the scenario, as many of the nurses have failed miserably to handle such emergency situation effectively.The following essay will mainly portray the reasons that are acting as the barriers to effective treatment and also how nurses can assess their performance to enhance their expertise in disaster nursing. Literature Review: Oztekin et al. (2015) had defined disaster as sudden serious occurrence that obstructs the regular functioning of the society or the community that result in widespread material, environmental and also economic losses. It mainly surpasses the capability of the community to cope up with the situation using its own resources. This often results in mass causality incidents. Researchers have also stated the definition of mass casualty incidents as incidents that results in more causalities beyond what can be handled by customary response assignments (Kang Piao, 2014). Therefore, proper nursing training is extremely important to save the lives of people during major disaster. They should portray effective means of handling such patients in distress with quick response and the correct and safest interventions that will help them to survive the accidents that they face (Loke Fung, 2014). Yan et al. (2015) have conducted researches on nurses response to disaster management. These nurses have mainly attended the disaster sites of three major earthquakes that had taken place in China.Researchers suggested that it is important for them to be knowledgeable about cardiopulmonary resuscitation along with the prevention of homeostasis, bandaging, fixation, manual handling as well as emergency handling. Yan suggested that intravenous insertion, observation and monitoring and mass casualty triage are some of the main skills required. This is because in reality, resuscitation is rarely used in disaster, as most resources will be shifted to help victims with a higher chance to survive. This showed that the nurses lack proper education in disaster management and the lack of awareness of their roles during disaster (Alim Kawabata, 2015). Researchers like Thobatty, William and Plummer (2015) have implemented the Disaster Nursing Core Competencies Scale in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), which have a very solid and rigorous framework. While closely evaluating the scale proposed, important factors have been evaluated. The first factor shows the important core competencies that can be covered by this scale and this involves important planning, triaging, nursing, ethical issues, communication, managing resources, workplace and community drill and also the psychological preparedness. The second factor mainly helps to tackle various barriers that the nurse may face like lack of various educations, training and expertise, support from leaders and also the presence of effective evaluation tools. The third factor mainly focuses the presence of effective guidelines that will help them to develop their best expertise. This type of measurement scale is indeed very effective as it covers all important measuring aspects that wil l help a nurse to review her own expertise and enhance it accordingly. Nicolsson et al. (2016)have stated that education in the topics of disaster preparedness, response and also management must be included and further developed as a very important area in training sessions. Moreover, also recommendations for regular team based disaster management drills should be incorporated. Discussions and offerings for proper education on how to handle threatening events and violence in healthcare settings, should be offered, as it would not only be restricted to emergency units. Evaluation: Researchers have worked on the cases of disaster nursing and they have stated that registered nurses are found to be more competent in handling disasters and also in self reporting of disaster management cases than nursing students (Hutton, VeenemaGebbie, 2016). Through thorough research, Nilsson et al. had found out that time constraint is notthe main reason for the incompetency. They depicted that it is the exposure to real life situations of disaster management that helps them to gain experiences. These help them to increase their readiness so that they can properly handle situations and also help them to act in accordance with different safety regulations(Ranse et al., 2014). However, this is not the case for nursing students as they are less exposed to such cases during their training years. Nilsson et al. have also given examples where he had found that the emergency department nurses and those working during night shift are more competent than the other health care nurses. Thi s helps us evaluate that a nurses expertise in disaster management gets better more with increasing exposure to various cases that they handle. Discussion: The World Health Organization reviewed disaster nursing to be one of the major criteria that needs attention from all training institutions and healthcare sectors all over the world. They have stated that it is necessary for the nurses and the midwives to act as the frontline workers during the events of any disaster to provide emergency rescue as well as care for the victims (Yamamoto, 2013). They have also researched over the issue and have also found that most nursesdo not receive proper education and training for handling such cases. NUR/EHA SEARO (Nursing/ The Emergency and Humanitarian Action of South East Asia Regional Office) in collaboration with NUR/EHA WPRO (Nursing/ The Emergency and Humanitarian Action Western Pacific Regional Office) have initiated one such program as the Asia Pacific Emergency and disaster Nursing Network in 2006 with an aim to prepare nurses to build capacity to handle this issue (WHO, 2017). The International Council of Nursing under the guidance of World Health organization have developed competencies for disaster nursing so that the generalist nurses can achieve the expertise of handling disaster moments. The first criteria, which they have taken into consideration, are the prevention or competencies, which mainly covers on risk reduction techniques, diseases presentation and helping in health promotion. It had also stated the importance of proper management through the introduction of proper guidelines and planned procedures. Secondly, they have stated the importance of incorporating the concept of competencies through ethical procedures as well as legal practice and accountability. Another area is communication and information sharing which is extremely important. Proper education and preparedness have also been of great importance. Thirdly, the framework covers the importance of response as means of nursing competencies. While handling disaster consequences the nurses should have proper critical thinking skills with the proper care for not only community but also for each individuals. They should also take the responsibility to provide psychological care and also care for vulnerable populations. Fourth and lastly the framework has instructed nurses to look over the recovery or the rehabilitation competencies by provision of long term, family and also community recovery by the individuals(International Council of Nurses, 2017). These frameworks had been developed by the nurses to help facilitate the deployment of different nurses globally and also create consistency in the disaster nursing care given. Building confidence along with the facilitation of the communication and more professional approach are the other competencies. Promoting shared aims along with the allowance for a unified approach is also found to be helpful. Other competencies that a nurse should achieve to develop expertise is the enhancement of the ability for the nurses to perform effectively within the organizational structure and also help in the assistance of nurses to function successfully and should behave responsibly as important members of multidisciplinary team. Therefore by following such framework, one can follow the advice of Yanamoto (2013) in preparing the nurse as the frontline workers. This framework will help Yanamotos view of developing the nurses in their skills and knowldges to suit them with the emergency requirements. Thobatty, William and Plummer (2015) have pointed out important scaling techniques that usually act as important assessment tools for the nursing students. A particular tool like the disaster preparedness evaluation tool (DPET) have been mentioned by them which had been developed by Bond and Tichy in 2007 for nurses in United States of America that help to evaluate the nurses capability to handle the disaster managements. Another tool that is also been used by several institutions and also by different nurses is the Emergency Preparedness Information Questionnaire(EPIQ) which had been developed by Wisniewwski et al. in 2004 in the form of questionnaires to help evaluate nurses preparedness for managing emergencies.Thobatty, William and Plummerhave developed a highly efficient tool themselves like the Disaster Nursing Core Competencies Scale exclusively for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia with a prior aim to help the nursing mentors and also the nurses. Conclusion: From the above essay, one can thereby understand that the main barriers to effective disaster management is the lack of proper education of nurses in handling emergency situations. If the nursing mentor can effectively handle the issue, one can expect better disaster management in the future which will help in saving many lives. References: Al Thobaity, A., Williams, B., Plummer, V. (2016). A new scale for disaster nursing core competencies: Development and psychometric testing.Australasian Emergency Nursing Journal,19(1), 11-19. Alim, S., Kawabata, M., Nakazawa, M. (2015).Evaluation of disaster preparedness training and disaster drill for nursing students.Nurse education today,35(1), 25-31. Hutton, A., Veenema, T. G., Gebbie, K. (2016). Review of the International Council of Nurses (ICN) Framework of Disaster Nursing Competencies.Prehospital and disaster medicine,31(6), 680-683. Icn.ch. (2017).Disaster Response Network. [online] Available at: https://www.icn.ch/networks/disaster-response-network/ [Accessed 24 Feb. 2017]. Jose, M. M., Dufrene, C. (2014). 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