University of Missouri – St. Louis Hosts Disaster Preparedness Conference

The University of Missouri – St. Louis (UMSL) recently transformed four of their classrooms into working parts of a disaster zone to help better prepare student and professional nurses for disasters and public health emergencies they may face over the course of their careers. The simulations were part of an innovative workshop on disaster preparedness, formed as a joint effort between UMSL, Johns Hopkins University, and Saint Louis University.

UMSL’s Roberta Lavin, associate dean for academic programs in the College of Nursing, spearheaded the program. She has a long career in disaster management and formerly served as a US Public Health officer, inspiring her to make sure the nurses in her community are prepared to handle disaster situations.

Attendees of the workshop were guided through online, interactive toolkits designed by Lavin and her colleagues to help them explore and learn from real-scenarios including 9/11, Zika, and the Flint water crisis. Then the day ended with a two-hour drill simulating a residential building fire and collapse.

Lavin tells Blogs.UMSL.edu, “Residential fires occur every day in every country. They are the most common disaster to impact an individual family. We wanted students to understand that an apartment fire in a small community with only a small hospital could indeed be a mass casualty event for that particular community.”

One room at the university was transformed into a health department, another into a hospital emergency department, a third into a field site, and a fourth into a casualty area. The purpose of the building fire simulation was to teach attendees that a disaster doesn’t have to garner national attention to be real and devastating. The workshop also focused on self and family preparedness, encouraging attendees to create a three-day, emergency “go bag” and extensive family plan in case of emergency. Nurses can’t do their jobs as effectively in a disaster without a plan for themselves and their family.