**3. Disaster medicine overview**

## **3.1 Disaster medicine as a field**

*'a discipline resulting from the marriage of emergency medicine and disaster management'*

*- Gregory R. Ciottone, Disaster Medicine 2nd Edition [4]*

Disaster medicine as a field represents all the components of possible disasters. It is a clinical subspecialty encompassing a combination of medical aspects of care in disasters and elements of other non-medical fields [5]. Main topics of import are the crossover of emergency medical care and emergency management, health systems response to disasters, response structure from local to international, the concept of surge, and the pathology and treatment of individuals and populations during general and specific disasters. From a hospital and healthcare perspective, disaster medicine is most critical in the response, recovery and preparedness phases of the disaster cycle. Adjusting the system and provision of care during the surge of an event, continuing patient care, adapting to changes in the complex systems required in the provision of care, as well as working with the response organizations, are all concepts and practices within disaster medicine. In addition, the recovery of normal operations requires thoughtful and dedicated processes also within the fundamentals of disaster medicine. Lastly, the field of disaster medicine is fluid, requiring adaption to new threats as well as adoption of new understandings and best practices [6].

## **3.2 Anticipated pathology**

The pathology of disaster events ranges from worsening of chronic disease, to trauma, to infectious diseases to event specific disease such as radiation sickness.

Examples of disaster related clinical pathology, its cause and its effect on hospital care.

• Trauma- any physical disruption, such as an act of violence, accidents, storms, earthquake all will increase trauma needs, often overwhelming hospitals.

