Disaster Preparedness

Pediatric Disaster Preparedness Toolkit

This toolkit features resources specific to pediatric disaster preparedness. Disaster preparedness is built on and dependent upon pediatric emergency systems of care that operate effectively day-to-day. Emergency care providers in both the prehospital and emergency department (ED) settings must have appropriate pediatric equipment and supplies, medical oversight, protocols and guidelines, and training in the care of children. Pediatric capabilities of EDs should be known and verified to facilitate initial transport or timely transfer to appropriate levels of care when needed, and transfer guidelines and agreements should be in place.

Health Resources on Children in Disasters and Emergencies.

This site is a compendium of resources related to medical and public health issues of children in disasters and emergencies. Links are provided to both journal articles and to other documents and materials that may be useful in preparedness, mitigation, response, and recovery activities. Resources are national or international in scope. (2016)

Checklist of Essential Pediatric Domains and Considerations for Every Hospital’s Disaster Preparedness Policies(also available in an interactive version)

Children have unique, often complex physiological, psychosocial, and psychological needs that differ from adults, especially during disaster situations; and unfortunately children are often involved when disasters occur. This Checklist is intended as a tool to help hospital administrators and leadership incorporate essential pediatric considerations into existing hospital disaster policies. (2014)

Essential Pediatric Domains and Considerations for Hospital Disaster Preparedness: Where Do We Begin?

This educational event was an in-depth discussion about the Checklist of Essential Pediatric Domains and Considerations for Every Hospital’s Disaster Preparedness Policies and how hospital leadership can use this new tool to incorporate pediatric considerations into existing hospital disaster policies. (April 2015)

Everyday Pediatric Readiness for Extraordinary Events (PowerPoint slides only)

This webcast highlighted best practices and lessons learned from the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) where the threat of a tsunami or typhoon is an everyday reality and where routine and extraordinary often intersect. The CNMI EMSC program discussed successes and challenges in pediatric disaster preparedness and response, including: the EMS systems and resources; interagency collaboration; and community planning, practice, response, and recovery. (April 2014)

National Pediatric Readiness Project: Preparing the Emergency Department to Provide Psychosocial Support to Children and Families in A Disaster

This webinar discussed short- and long-term effects of disaster on the psychological functioning, emotional adjustment, health, and developmental trajectory of children; identified key elements in the behavioral health domain essential to the provision of psychosocial support to children and families in the aftermath of disaster; and described practical ways to incorporate behavior health policies and practices into disaster plans and embed them into everyday practice. (October 2015)

ASPR TRACIE

ASPR’s Technical Resources, Assistance Center, and Information Exchange (TRACIE) was created to meet the information and technical assistance needs of regional ASPR staff, healthcare coalitions, healthcare entities, healthcare providers, emergency managers, public health practitioners, and others working in disaster medicine, healthcare system preparedness, and public health emergency preparedness. (2016)

JumpSTART Pediatric MCI Triage Tool

This tool was designed to help meet the needs of children and responders at disaster/mass casualty scenes. JumpSTART is now widely used for primary pediatric disaster triage in the U.S. and Canada and is gaining popularity around the world. All materials on this website may be downloaded free of charge for educational or protocol purposes. (2012)

2017-2020 Hospital Preparedness Program Performance Measures Implementation Guidance

This guidance document is framed for the primary users—awardees and healthcare coalitions (HCCs)—to foster ease of comprehension, improve information aggregation, and enable faster data collection. The intended audience for this document is any individual responsible for collecting and reporting data on awardee and HCC progress toward meeting the goals of the four capabilities detailed in the 2017-2022 Health Care Preparedness and Response Capabilities.

AAP Pediatric Preparedness Resource Kit

This kit allows for pediatricians, public health leaders, and other pediatric care providers to assess what is already happening in their community or state, and help determine what needs to be done before an emergency or disaster.

Promoting Adjustment and Helping Children Cope After Disaster and Crisis

This page contains multiple resources from AAP how to help all children during or immediately following a disaster by providing psychological first aid.

Homeland Security Exercise and Evaluation Program (HSEEP)

HSEEP provides a set of guiding principles for exercise programs, as well as a common approach to exercise program management, design and development, conduct, evaluation, and improvement planning.

CDC Public Health Grand Rounds: Addressing Preparedness Challenges for Children in Public Health Emergencies

This session of the Public Health Grand Rounds discusses strategies to address the unique vulnerabilities of children in every stage of emergency planning. It highlights the strong progress that has been made in pediatric disaster readiness as well as the collaboration that is still needed between public health professionals and pediatric care providers to improve the outcomes for children during emergencies.

EMSC Hospital Pediatric Preparedness Checklist

This checklist is designed to help hospitals identify their current level of pediatric preparedness and recognize additional opportunities for improvement. This checklist is also used during EMSC Pediatric Facility Recognition Site Surveys.

Pediatric Surge Planning Train the Trainer

The purpose of this course is to help prepare general acute care facilities to the challenges of pediatrics. The course is designed for a target audience that has knowledge of disaster planning. It is based on in-depth research of best practices and other existing curricula to bring best practice. The goal of this curriculum is to prepare hospitals and clinics have the tools to respond more effectively in a disaster which involves a surge of child victims.

Preparedness Checklist for Pediatric Practices

This checklist empowers pediatricians to be ready to provide care for their patients when normal operations are disrupted due to emergency events by having fundamental supplies to ensure self-sufficiency for at least 72 hours.

CDC Planning Resources for Pediatric Offices and Hospitals

This page contains resources that pediatric healthcare providers can use to plan for emergencies, including tool kits for pandemic flu, communication tools, and disaster plan templates.

Post-Disaster Reunification of Children: A Nationwide Approach

Reunifying unaccompanied minors and separated or missing children with their parents or legal guardians in the aftermath of a disaster is a priority. This document is designed to support overall reunification processes and procedures by establishing a fundamental baseline, assisting in identifying the roles of lead and supporting agencies and organizations, and serving as a tool to enhance reunification elements of existent emergency preparedness plans and/or help guide the development of new all-hazards reunification plan elements and procedures.

“Taking Care of Kids: Are You Prepared for an Emergency?” (Order at no-cost)

This Institute of Medicine’s poster provides resources to assist parents, child care providers, schools, and pediatricians in preparing for, responding to, and recovering from disasters.

Office of Human Services Emergency Preparedness and Response, Administration of Children and Families

This site contains resources from OHSEPR, which promotes resilience for individuals, families, and communities impacted by disasters & public health emergencies by providing expertise in human services policy, planning, operations, and partnerships.

Health Resources on Children in Disasters and Emergencies from the Disaster Information Management Research Center

This site is a compendium of resources related to medical and public health issues of children in disasters and emergencies. Links are provided to both journal articles and to other documents and materials that may be useful in preparedness, mitigation, response and recovery activities. The resources target health providers, emergency and community planners, and others in the disaster workforce who work with or on behalf of children.

Coordinating Pediatric Medical Care During An Influenza Pandemic: Hospital Workbook

This workbook is intended to assist hospitals with coordinating medical care for pediatric influenza-like illness (ILI) across their community. This tool can be adapted for use during pandemic spread of a novel influenza virus as well as H1N1. It is presented in two sections, identified by type of hospital focus: Children’s Hospital Focus and General Hospital Focus.

Pediatric Technical Resources from TRACIE

This Topic Collection contains comprehensive list of resources relevant to general pediatric disaster planning. The page also contains several additional Topic Collections with pediatric sub-categories.

Disaster Lit: Resource Guide for Disaster Medicine and Public Health

This is a database of links to disaster medicine and public health documents available on the Internet at no cost. Documents include expert guidelines, research reports, conference proceedings, training classes, fact sheets, websites, databases, and similar materials selected from over 700 organizations for a professional audience.

The National Child Traumatic Stress Network’s resources on disasters

This page contains multiple resources on providing psychological first aid to children during and following emergencies.

The Psychological First Aid Field Manual, National Child Traumatic Stress Network and the National Center for PTSD

This is an evidence-informed approach for assisting children, adolescents, adults, and families in the aftermath of disaster and terrorism.