Capella 4060 Assessment 3

Assessment 3: Disaster Recovery Plan

Name:

Capella University

FPX-NURS 4060: Practicing in the Community to Improve Population Health

Prof. Name:

Date

Disaster Recovery Plan

Hello everyone, my name is {Student-Name}, and I work at ABC Hospital as a senior nurse. Today I’m going to deliver a presentation focused on disaster preparedness and recovery plan.  As a result of a short dialogue with the hospital administrator Jennifer, I learned that there has been an alertness about impending tornados by the National Weather Services (NWS). NWS further suggested that our hospital should prepare beforehand for a disaster recovery plan for dealing with mass casualties effectively. First, I’ll talk about various factors affecting safety from the disaster management perspective. 

Determinants of Health and Factors that Affect Safety and Disaster Recovery Efforts

A disaster recovery plan is the strategic process implemented for obtaining an immediate response against the damages as a result of a disaster and bringing back normality after a chaotic event. It is used in hospitals to prepare for a greater number of emergency medical treatment requirements for the affected people in a disaster and manage the mass casualties and further situations post-disaster. It is also necessary to keep providing care treatments to already admitted patients surrounding the disastrous event.  Various factors integrated together impact the health of community individuals and safety in disaster recovery. A few of them are social, cultural, and economic factors which I’ll discuss in the subsequent section.

Cultural Barriers and their Impact on Disaster Recovery

Various cultural factors impact the safety, health, and disaster recovery efforts including lack of interconnectivity with the rest of the community leading to universal disparities and hindering the progression of health safety and disaster recovery efforts. In disaster events, lack of communication due to the diverse cultural language can also impact the safety, health, and disaster recovery efforts. Additionally, other cultural factors include different health beliefs, local traditions, stigma, and poor health literacy. For example, a shortage of information, mistrust of healthcare organizations, and conspiracy theories resulted in a low vaccination rate in Yemen between 2013-2016 involving a 36.4% decline in measles vaccine uptake affecting infants’ safety and further hindering the disaster recovery efforts (Rahmani et al., 2022). Some culturally sensitive people reject the medical and basic health aid from community and hospital organizations which impacts the safety and disaster recovery efforts. For example, in Asian countries people deem psychotic symptoms from disasters as possession by a spirit and look for spiritual healing instead of psychiatric treatment delaying disaster recovery efforts (Rahmani et al., 2022). 

Capella 4060 Assessment 3

Social Barriers and Their Impact on Disaster Recovery

Social barriers that impact health, safety, and disaster recovery efforts are those factors or conditions in which individuals are born, grown, their living conditions, their education, working conditions, and age which are also called social determinants of health. Some of these social barriers are poverty, discrimination based on gender, race, certain policies of a healthcare organization, increased healthcare workforce turnover, and lack of cooperation among inter-organizational teams for disaster recovery (Berchtold et al., 2020). These disparities related to gender, race, and color in health care provision particularly in destructive events such as unfortunate disasters can lead to enhanced delay in disaster recovery efforts’ implications and affects patient health and safety as well. For instance, healthcare individuals are not adequate to provide basic care treatments or some people belonging to a particular race or ethnicity get treatment later than others due to ethnic disparities (Rouhanizadeh et al., 2020). This is the duty of healthcare organizations that they overcome these social barriers so that health equity is promoted in disastrous events and recovery from a disaster can be achieved as soon as possible with joint efforts and fair treatment provision.

Economic Barriers and Their Impact on Disaster Recovery Efforts

In any chaotic event, financial assistance is of great importance in renormalizing the situations after the unfortunate incident of disaster and in providing health and safety to the affected individuals. As a massive loss of resources in terms of capital takes place in disaster events and requires more finances to replenish them and financial constraints occur which prevent the early recovery of affected individuals and there is also the decline of economic growth of the community. The provision of free healthcare treatments to the affected people by disastrous events promotes their health and safety along with the progression of disaster recovery efforts. Various organizations such as American Red Cross can cooperate with healthcare systems to assist in the prompt recovery of people from the disaster in these times of economic deterioration (Rouhanizadeh et al., 2020).

Capella 4060 Assessment 3

All of these contributing factors are interconnected to each other and are overall known as determinants of health. Overcoming social factors such as age, sex, and poverty together with caring for culturally-sensitive people will result in better health consequences and it will promote economic upgradation post-trauma. Additionally, finance’s role in battling these social and cultural barriers will enhance the process of disaster recovery efforts. Therefore, a disaster recovery plan must have complete integration of these factors and the strategies to overcome them for the better safety of affected people of disasters.

Proposed Disaster Recovery Plan

In view of the factors that affect the disaster recovery plan and its efforts from healthcare and safety perspectives, I developed a disaster recovery plan for preparing for the possible impending tornados by utilizing an approach i.e. MAP-IT approach. This proposed plan is described as follows:

Mobilize

In this step, we will gather those people or groups of people or organizations that are desiring to participate in collaboration for creating an efficient disaster recovery plan. They can be hospital administration, humanitarian organizations that work for the wellness of people, religious parties willing to work for the betterment of humanity, and local schools and colleges. Integrated efforts of all these groups will lead to an integrated, effective, and community-based recovery plan. This phase of the MAP-IT approach also involves making team groups and assigning responsibilities.

Assess

In this step, the gathered teams will analyze the needs in terms of available facilities. These needs can be individual or as a community based-needs as well. In our case of Valley City, some people are deaf and there is a need of recruiting a group of individuals or a team who have a firm grip on sign language and can communicate with them through sign language. Additionally, some elderly people with chronic diseases such as diabetes, and hypertension needed extra care in terms of diet and medication so that their glycemic control and blood pressure do not reach the exceedingly dangerous value so special nurses should be assigned to them for taking extra care of them. There are also disabled people in Valley City whose disability needs demands special teams and special auxiliary aids such as crutches, wheelchairs, etc. for aiding them through the disaster and saving their lives. Considering the financial state of the Valley City which shows that economic growth is not high, private influential groups should work together in creating more shelter homes as Valley City has scarce shelter homes, and in case of disaster, there is a high demand for shelter homes. Additionally, hospital requirements such as increased ambulances, a greater number of beds, and hospital devices for care treatment should be increased for providing adequate and effective care treatment to disaster-affected people.

Planning:

After assessing and analyzing the needs of the people and community at Valley City, Capella 4060 Assessment 3. we will establish planning for how to recover the people and community from the disastrous event. This needs resource allocation, setting up of priorities, and establishing short-term and long-term goals which should be specific, measurable, realistic, and time-bound as the SMART goal strategy describes. This will enable evident results by the planned disaster recovery efforts.

Implement

In this step, the planning of the disaster recovery efforts will be brought into action in the community so that desired and expected results can be evident. By implementing the proposed planning, disaster recovery efforts start to bring betterment in people who are affected by the disasters, and the recovery from the disaster starts in this step. This demands interprofessional collaboration and effective communication strategies that are used for promoting disaster recovery efforts.

Track

In this last step, we will record and monitor the consequences and outcomes of our proposed recovery plan in the disaster and ensure the results meet our goals and objectives, and make amends in the planning in case of poor results. This is an important step to sustain the improvements in the disaster recovery as any negative outcomes can be improved and redesigned on tracking the events. 

Disaster Recovery Plan and How It Can Lessen Health Disparities and Improve Access to Community Resources

The objective of this proposed disaster recovery plan is that it should lessen health disparities and enhance the access of affected people to community resources. These objectives are procured by following the principles of social justice and cultural sensitivity. Social justice in disasters is defined as delivering welfare and legal protection which makes the population at risk to secure their assets (McNeill et al., 2019). It is only viable by considering and practicing the social determinants of health during and after developing a disaster recovery plan and when every citizen of Valley City gets health equity. The disaster recovery plan validates that every individual will get treatment without age, gender, ethnicity-related differences, and socioeconomic status. In the planning phase of the proposed disaster plan, the priorities set as standards will assess the individuals who are more at risk, and then the allocation of resources will be done equitably. It will enhance the practicality of social justice along with improved access to community resources. This can also be promoted by collaborating with the stakeholders participating in improving disaster recovery and ensuring that all healthcare amenities are equitably accessible to all affected people. The proposed disaster recovery plan also emphasizes treating culturally sensitive people with great care and being respectful of their cultural values and morals. By respecting culturally sensitive people and their values, health equity can be promoted as they will feel valued and included in disaster recovery efforts (Rahmani et al., 2022). It is imperative to be aware of such people and the cultural sensitivities and strategies should be practiced to deal with such scenarios in disaster management so that health disparities are lessened. Nurses participating in disaster recovery efforts and management should be culturally competent enough to deliver culturally sensitive support and care. This demands the use of community resources having enhanced access. 

Impact of Health and Governmental Policy on Disaster Recovery Efforts

Numerous policies have been launched in the light of disaster management by healthcare organizations and governmental setups. These policies are made for the healthcare and governmental setups in order to prepare for disastrous and catastrophic events and manage them with rapid recovery without causing haphazardness. The Stafford Act is the prime source of authority for the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA’s) disaster assistance and management program. This act provides disaster alertness and also federal aid to affected individuals and families as a result of havoc. Later, it is amended by The Sandy Recovery Improvement Act of 2013 so that the effectiveness and quality of disaster aid are improved. It also provides some changes to improve the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program and permits FEMA to deliver up to 25% of the estimated costs of hazard mitigation to a grantee in advance of the incurred costs (Rubin, 2020). 

Another policy that impacts disaster management is the Pandemic and All-Hazards Preparedness Act (PAHPA) of 2006 which established the National Health Security Strategy Implementation Program (NHSS/IP) which signifies the practice of building and sustaining healthy, resilient communities by improving the coordination of healthcare organization and human services by community collaboration and fostering resilience in cultures across the nation. It also emphasizes ameliorating the national capacity to develop and efficiently use both medical treatments and non-pharmaceutical interventions, enabling concise health situational awareness so that decisions can be supported before incidents and during response and recovery efforts. Thus, it ultimately enhances the integration and effectiveness of public health, health care, and disaster management systems and supports overall global health security (World Health Organization, 2019). These policies and acts encourage the stakeholders and disaster management organizations to practice the guidelines which are based on Healthy People 2030 goals to effectively manage and recover the harms entailed on individuals, populations, and communities by the disasters and renormalize the situations of affected people in a strategic manner for improved outcomes and results.

Communication Strategies and Interprofessional Collaboration

Every proposed plan can not be implemented without communication. The presence of communication barriers only hinders the execution of the planning. In disaster management and recovery efforts, it is important that all stakeholders are effectively communicating. Interprofessional collaboration holds significant value in bringing recoveries post-catastrophic events. As various fields of people are required in disaster management, interprofessional collaboration is imperative and must be present in disaster recovery plans. When interprofessional collaboration takes place in times like disaster recovery management, it is common to have communication barriers. Communication challenges faced during disaster management can be due to a lack of communication or incompatibility of communication equipment. Overcoming these communication barriers can be done by developing and implementing appropriate strategies such as developing a platform that can facilitate interprofessional collaboration and communication and promoting an easier way of data sharing across the two bodies (Abdeen et al., 2021). Having a platform for communication such as a digital platform by utilizing technology and making the data available to all interprofessional volunteers working for mitigating disaster aftermaths and promoting dialogue-style communication can uplift the communication barrier and enhance interprofessional collaboration. Data sharing can be done on social-media applications where all interprofessional volunteers are connected and notified every time the data are shared (Mirbabaie et al., 2020). Recruiting multi-lingual personnel to help understand diverse languages and make communication easier is another strategy to overcome the communication barrier as a result of language barrier (Uekusa & Matthewman, 2023). The use of these strategies will result in better communication and better provision of healthcare facilities and non-pharmaceutical interventions and ameliorate the process of recovery post-disaster. This is why, during disaster recovery efforts communication should be made effective using these strategies so that health and wellness can be enhanced for the victims of the disaster events.

Conclusion 

Disaster management and recovery plans are important to deliver adequate medical services and non-medical interventions to the victims of any unfortunate disaster events. In disaster recovery efforts, it is imperative to include cultural, social, and economic factors that can affect the recovery plan and its expected goals. This is done by considering social justice and cultural insensitivity in providing care. In this presentation, the Disaster recovery plan is developed on the basis of MAP-IT methodology and is developed in such a way that it lessens health disparities, and enhances access to healthcare services. Effective communication and interprofessional collaboration are important for executing a progressive disaster recovery plan.

References:

Abdeen, F. N., Fernando, T., Kulatunga, U., Hettige, S., & Ranasinghe, K. D. A. (2021). Challenges in multi-agency collaboration in disaster management: A Sri Lankan perspective. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, 62, 102399. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2021.102399 

Berchtold, C., Vollmer, M., Sendrowski, P., Neisser, F., Müller, L., & Grigoleit, S. (2020). Barriers and facilitators in interorganizational disaster response: Identifying examples across europe. International Journal of Disaster Risk Science, 11(1), 46–58. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13753-020-00249-y 

Finucane, M. L., Acosta, J., Wicker, A., & Whipkey, K. (2020). Short-Term solutions to a long-term challenge: Rethinking disaster recovery planning to reduce vulnerabilities and inequities. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 17(2), 482. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17020482 

McNeill, C. C., Richie, C., & Alfred, D. (2019). Individual emergency-preparedness efforts: A social justice perspective. Nursing Ethics, 27(1), 096973301984362. https://doi.org/10.1177/0969733019843621 

Mirbabaie, M., Ehnis, C., Stieglitz, S., Bunker, D., & Rose, T. (2020). Digital nudging in social media disaster communication. Information Systems Frontiers, 23. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10796-020-10062-z 

Rahmani, M., Muzwagi, A., & Pumariega, A. J. (2022). Cultural factors in disaster response among diverse children and youth around the world. Current Psychiatry Reports, 24. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11920-022-01356-x 

Rouhanizadeh, B., Kermanshachi, S., & Nipa, T. J. (2020). Exploratory analysis of barriers to effective post-disaster recovery. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, 50(1), 101735. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2020.101735 

Rubin, C. B. (Ed.). (2019). Emergency management: The American Experience (3rd ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429425059

Uekusa, S., & Matthewman, S. (2023). Preparing multilingual disaster communication for the crises of tomorrow: A conceptual discussion. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, 87, 103589. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2023.103589 

World Health Organization. (2019). Strengthening Partnerships for a safer world: Report of the global technical consultation on strengthening national health security through pandemic influenza preparedness planning: Hong Kong SAR, 10–12 December 2018. World Health Organization. Retrieved May 6, 2023, from https://apps.who.int/iris/handle/10665/326575