TY - JOUR
PY - 2017//
TI - Changes to the Korean disaster medical assistance system after numerous multi-casualty incidents in 2014 and 2015
JO - Disaster medicine and public health preparedness
A1 - Cha, Myeong-Il
A1 - Choa, Minhong
A1 - Kim, Seunghwan
A1 - Cho, Jinseong
A1 - Choi, Dai Hai
A1 - Cho, Minsu
A1 - Kim, Won
A1 - Kim, Chu Hyun
A1 - Kang, Daehyun
A1 - Heo, Yun Jung
A1 - Kim, Jung Eon
A1 - Yoon, Han Deok
A1 - Wang, Soon Joo
SP - 526
EP - 530
VL - 11
IS - 5
N2 - OBJECTIVE: A number of multiple-casualty incidents during 2014 and 2015 brought changes to Korea's disaster medical assistance system. We report these changes here.
METHODS: Reports about these incidents, revisions to laws, and the government's revised medical disaster response guidelines were reviewed.
RESULTS: The number of DMAT (Disaster Medical Assistance Team) staff members was reduced to 4 from 8, and the mobilization method changed. An emergency response manual was created that contains the main content of the DMAT, and there is now a DMAT training program to educate staff. The government created and launched a national 24-hour Disaster Emergency Medical Service Situation Room, and instead of the traditional wireless communications, mobile instant smart phone messaging has been added as a new means of communication. The number of disaster base hospitals has also been doubled.
CONCLUSION: Although there are still limitations that need to be remedied, the changes to the current emergency medical assistance system are expected to improve the system's response capacity. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2017;page 1 of 5).
Language: en
LA - en SN - 1935-7893 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/dmp.2016.202 ID - ref1 ER -