Elsevier

Disaster Management & Response

Volume 5, Issue 3, July–September 2007, Pages 82-86
Disaster Management & Response

Research Study
Assessment of Physician Preparedness and Response Capacity to Bioterrorism or Other Public Health Emergency Events in a Major Metropolitan Area

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dmr.2007.05.001Get rights and content

Background

The role of physicians in the detection, reporting, and response to infectious disease outbreaks, anomalous biologic events, or other public health emergencies is critical to the community's safety.

Objective/Method

In an effort to assess the level of preparedness of local physicians to respond to such events, the City of Fort Worth Public Health Department, the Fort Worth/Tarrant County Health Authority, and the Tarrant County Medical Society collaborated in designing and administering a cross-sectional study in spring 2006.

Results

The results serve as a baseline of the local clinical community's preparedness, with 91% of local physicians reporting their knowledge as “fair-poor,” 80% desiring more information, and 83% favoring more training opportunities.

Conclusion

Information obtained through this assessment is used to help cultivate educational interventions that will enhance the participation, integration, and mobilization of clinicians in the event of a community emergency.

Section snippets

Methods/Materials

The survey instrument designed for use in this assessment was modeled after validated and published survey instruments described in public health emergency−related literature6, 9 and multidisciplinary input from various members of the Fort Worth Bioterrorism and Health Emergency Preparedness team, Fort Worth Public Health epidemiologists, Fort Worth/Tarrant County Health Authority, and the TCMS. The final survey instrument (Figure 1) consisted of 9 questions that focused on 4 main areas of

Results

Of the 3202 survey packages mailed, 465 were completed and returned, resulting in a response rate of 15.5% (465/3000). A total of 6.3% (n = 202) of the mailed packets were undeliverable because of incorrect addresses. Most respondents (n = 301, 64.7%) were members of the TCMS.

The majority of respondents (n = 360, 79.3%) reported not having participated in bioterrorism preparedness and response training. Most respondents also reported not having completed CDLS or BDLS trainings (n = 430, 93.9%;

Discussion

The results of this study provide a baseline assessment of physicians' current level of bioterrorism emergency preparedness, response capabilities, and training needs within a major metropolitan area. Although there was a low response rate, the survey yielded a sufficient sample size for reliable statistical inference. Despite efforts to train local physicians since 2002, a finding consistent with other studies6, 7, 8 was that the majority of respondents reported no previous bioterrorism

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