International Training on Disaster Medicine – IFMSA

Name of the activity: International Training on Disaster Medicine

Country/NMO: IFMSA

Program: Emergency, Disaster Risk & Humanitarian Action

Type of the activity: Capacity Building

General description:

Over the last century, the number of disasters has remarkably increased, indicating
that future generations of physicians will be called upon to provide mass-casualty
treatment to an even greater extent than before. A number of studies point to the
lack of adequate training in the medical management of disaster response – a
deficiency that has become dramatically apparent in the recent past. In every major
emergency there are still significant numbers of aid personnel who lack some of
essential skills, as a consequence, many governments and scientific institutions
agree that disaster medicine education should be included in the standard medical
curriculum. The importance of enhancing education and training in disaster
medicine has widely been perceived by medical students emphasizing that are
willing to respond to public health emergencies and disasters. However, recent
studies have been shown that only a small percentage of medical schools
worldwide have included disaster medicine education in their study program.
Therefore, training medical students to obtain competencies for becoming
humanitarian health professionals is essential.
During the period of 2013 – 2016, IFMSA has enhanced its members engagement in
the field of disaster medicine and humanitarian health. Through this engagement, a
series of trainings have been provided to members of IFMSA in international,
regional, national, and local level: Global Health Camp, Egypt 2013; PreMM, Tunisia
2014; preEuRegMe, Poland 2014; preAM2014, Taiwan 2014; preMM2015, Turkey
2015 to name a few. The trainings provided a platform for continuous learning and
enabled production of the first ever International Training of Disaster Medicine
Trainers in summer 2015 in Novara, Italy.
3 This training is build on best practice on
previous program content and will serve as a guide for future disaster medicine
three days trainings.
The objectives of this 3-day workshop is in line with the work done in previous
years through IFMSA on topics of Disaster Medicine, Medical Ethics in disasters and
Humanitarian Actions.
Methodology is mainly: simulations, lectures, workshops, etc…

Focus area:

Disaster resilience (including prevention, preparedness and response)

Problem statement:

Over the last century, the number of disasters has remarkably increased, indicating
that future generations of physicians will be called upon to provide mass-casualty
treatment to an even greater extent than before. A number of studies point to the
lack of adequate training in the medical management of disaster response – a
deficiency that has become dramatically apparent in the recent past. In every major
emergency there are still significant numbers of aid personnel who lack some of
essential skills, as a consequence, many governments and scientific institutions
agree that disaster medicine education should be included in the standard medical
curriculum. The importance of enhancing education and training in disaster
medicine has widely been perceived by medical students emphasizing that are
willing to respond to public health emergencies and disasters. However, recent
studies have been shown that only a small percentage of medical schools
worldwide have included disaster medicine education in their study program.
Therefore, training medical students to obtain competencies for becoming
humanitarian health professionals is essential.
As the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction says there’s an urgent need
to ‘’enhance the resilience of national health systems, including by integrating
disaster risk management into primary, secondary and tertiary health care,
especially at the local level’’
1
. The stress is being put on developing the capacity
building of health workers in understanding disaster risk and applying and
implementing disaster risk reduction approaches in health work. Additionally, it has
been recognized that promoting and enhancing the training capacities in the field of
disaster medicine as well as supporting and training community health groups in
disaster risk reduction approaches in health programmes is crucial for strengthening
health systems and making them resilient in front of disasters. At the same time
there is a need for stronger collaboration within and among different sectors, as
well as in the implementation of the International Health Regulations (2005) of the
World Health Organization’’.
1
Moreover, the topic is poorly represented in medical curriculum, especially in
countries that are stricken by disasters, whether that be natural, biological,
technological or man made and we as future health care professionals have to take
the lead and advocate for better disaster preparedness within the health system.
Hospital safety as well as health professionals endangerment while in response
teams in the frontlines is just starting to be an issue after the events in
Afghanistan
2 and there is still much work to be done in the awareness and
implementation of International Humanitarian Law.
During the period of 2013 – 2016, IFMSA has enhanced its members engagement in
the field of disaster medicine and humanitarian health. Through this engagement, a
series of trainings have been provided to members of IFMSA in international,
regional, national, and local level: Global Health Camp, Egypt 2013; PreMM, Tunisia
2014; preEuRegMe, Poland 2014; preAM2014, Taiwan 2014; preMM2015, Turkey
2015 to name a few. The trainings provided a platform for continuous learning and
enabled production of the first ever International Training of Disaster Medicine
Trainers in summer 2015 in Novara, Italy.
3 This training is build on best practice on
previous program content and will serve as a guide for future disaster medicine
three days trainings

Target groups and beneficiaries:

Medical students from different cultural, religious, socioeconomic, national
backgrounds. There is no need of previous knowledge in disaster medicine or
previous engagement on the topic. Selection will be done based on the motivation
and opportunity of participants to use the knowledge and skills in their communities
and their NMO. Expected number of participants is 25 – 30.

Objectives and indicators of success:

The objectives of this 3-day workshop is in line with the work done in previous
years through IFMSA on topics of Disaster Medicine, Medical Ethics in disasters and
Humanitarian Actions.
It aims to:
1) Provide medical students with basic knowledge and introduction to the
speciality of Disaster Medicine and create understanding of the disaster
management system;
2) Provide a platform for students from different socioeconomic, cultural,
national, religious backgrounds to discuss their perceptions of disaster
medicine’s general and specific needs, especially in humanitarian issues, and
use the opportunity to analyse medical ethical dilemmas in disaster settings;
3) Provide a platform for participants of IFMSA – CRIMEDIM Training for Disaster
Medicine Training (TdmT) held in Novara, Italy to train medical students
using peer-to-peer methodology by sharing knowledge and skills learned
during the TdmT;
4) Create a momentum of medical students that are equipped to advocate for
the need of training on disaster medicine and stressed actions on ethical
dilemmas in disasters;
5) Inspire medical students to use the knowledge acquainted to continue
learning more about the Disaster Medicine through platform of IFMSA
Program on Emergency, Disaster Risk management and Humanitarian
Actions and online platform of TdmT;
6) Empower medical students to do actions on disaster medicine and
humanitarian actions in their communities through IFMSA Program on
Emergency, Disaster Risk management and Humanitarian Actions

Success Indicators are being developed.
We will be having pre and post tests sent to participants preliminarily.

Methodology:

Methodology
Lectures
Oral presentation using pictures, videos and other type of visual presentations
intended to deliver core information, facts and principles about the topics and serve
as an introduction in further development of knowledge and ideas through other
methods.
Workshops/Role-plays
Interactive methodology where participants discuss and or work in breakouts
groups. This method offers active engagement of participants and will enable them
to develop deeper understanding of knowledge provided or / and develop action
plans for further engagement in national or local level. The diversity of background
of participants will ultimately serve the purpose to challenge all participants’ beliefs,
ideas, historic and other background aiming to create new ideas and concepts.
Simulation/Games
Simulation is an innovative educational method which actively involves participants
in a hypothetical situation that is based on a simplified “real world”. Participants are
provided with opportunities to apply their theoretical knowledge in a safe and
realistic setting, develop team working and critical thinking skills, and a systematic
approach to problem solving. Simulations necessitate extensive debriefing and
in-depth analysis of the experience of the participants following the completion of
every activity.
Movie​ ​/​ ​Documentary
Storytelling is important part of learning experience and offers insight in the real
word experiences. During the training participants will have opportunity to see
several movies/documentaries that will allow them to get the stories from the
professionals from the field or question their perception of the world.
Presentation​ ​by​ ​participants
This is used for increasing participation, attention and motivation of participants
and to ensure best usage of multinational representations. The national
perspectives and content of the presentations helps them recap and deepen what
they have learnt.
Presentation​ ​by​ ​external​ ​speakers
Representative of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) will join us
for this workshop to facilitate some sessions. This speaker will be affiliated with The
Health Care in Danger project, which is an initiative of the International Red Cross
and Red Crescent Movement aimed at addressing the issue of violence against
patients, health-care workers, facilities and vehicles, and ensuring safe access to
and delivery of health care in armed conflict and other emergencies. This is used for
participants to understand the concept of International Humanitarian Law, its use
and violations in the field, accompanied by an overview of ICRC’s work in
humanitarian and emergencies settings.

Plans for evaluation:

The program report will be filled in every time an ITDM is delivered and sent to the SCORP-D.
The pre and post tests for participants will also be done and shared with the SCORP-D. It is our main tool to evaluate the impact of this workshop.