PREPARING
PEDIATRICIANS FOR DISASTERS
Karen Olness, MD, FAAP
Case Western Reserve University, Rainbow Babies and Children’s
Hospital, Cleveland, Ohio, USA
Disasters,
including natural, chemical, and war related, have increased ten fold in
the past 15 years. More than
half the victims of disasters are children. The special needs of children, with respect to both
acute and long term issues, are not generally recognized by relief
workers. It is important that
more child health specialists become knowledgeable about disasters,
especially those defined as complex humanitarian emergencies. For six years
we have taught an intense one week course on “Management of Complex
Humanitarian Emergencies: focus on children and families” at Rainbow Babies
and Children’s Hospital in Cleveland, Ohio. This course has been endorsed by the International
Pediatric Association and by the American Academy of Pediatrics. 150 child health professionals have
completed this training. 20
have come from other areas of the world, including Uganda, Thailand, Laos,
El Salvador, Nicaragua, Mexico, and Turkey. In March 2001 we completed a training trainer’s program
for the same course at Khon Kaen University, in Khon Kaen, Thailand. Khon Kaen will now become a center
for this type of training in SE Asia.
In 2000 the American Academy of Pediatrics established a Child Disaster Network which will provide
volunteers with training and/or experience in working with children in
disasters to be available to UN and NGO relief agencies on very short
notice when disasters occur.