Roles of Nurses in Disaster Preparedness and Response - Essay Example

"Roles of Nurses in Disaster Preparedness and Response" is an engrossing example of a paper on care.
The occurrence of natural disasters, hurricane Sandy, requires the intervention of numerous departments, including the nursing department. Nurses play an essential role in disaster preparedness and management, where they play a wide range of roles. One such role is public education and sensitization (Veenema, 2018). Nurses help provide the general public with the necessary information regarding natural disasters and some of the first aid procedures that people can perform on their injured family or friends. Additionally, as members of a disaster response team, nurses can contribute information on how best the team can undertake recovery while ensuring personal safety and the safety of those affected. In the response team, nurses have equally important roles to play, including providing the needed medical assistance to those affected (Nash, 2017). Furthermore, nurses may conduct activities aimed at controlling and mitigating incidences that occur in the wake of disasters, like poor nutrition and the spread of water-borne diseases, as is the case of hurricane Sandy.

Challenges and the Current Patient Population.

The American population is increasingly becoming heterogeneous, meaning that nurses interact with individuals from different cultures, races, and even religions daily. When working with such a community, nurses are most likely to face numerous challenges when a disaster occurs. One such challenge is religious barriers (VanDevanter et al., 2017). For example, as a nurse, you may need to conduct CPR on a Muslim lady who is unconscious due to taking in too much water. However, as a male nurse, Muslim religious customs would not allow that. Another challenge for the nurses is long working hours, resulting in fatigue and burnout (VanDevanter et al., 2017). Generally, heterogeneous populations tend to be large, and attending to every member of the community may result in fatigue for the nurses. Finally, expectations can also form a significant challenge for nurses. Usually, various individuals will expect nurses to perform 'miracles,' which might affect the nurses' abilities to function (VanDevanter et al., 2017).

Gaining more Hands-on training to Supplement Academic Study

What nursing students learn in the classroom is not enough to guarantee their performance in the real world. Nursing students need to be exposed to more ‘real’ situations to develop nursing skills and expertise. One way of doing this is through continuous volunteering (Nash, 2017). As soon as we learn necessary nursing skills, we as nursing students are encouraged to undertake numerous volunteering programs in the field to gain more experience. For instance, volunteering during hurricane Sandy would give a nursing student more insight into responding to natural disasters. Additionally, with technological advancements, new systems like simulator machines, create 3D impressions of specific situations, and by undertaking training using such machines, nurses can gain more hands-on skills (Veenema, 2018).  

How to Improve on Preparedness

Upon completing a nursing degree, many nursing novices often feel unprepared to join the practice since they often feel like they do not possess enough skills. However, there are various ways of helping these nurses improve their preparedness. A basic one is getting positive staff support (Purling & King, 2016). By getting a positive reception and support from the more qualified nurses, I believe the confidence level can improve considerably. Additionally, undertaking residency programs helps nurses develop confidence in their abilities, making them more prepared (Purling & King, 2016).

Additional Training Options

For nurses to remain effective in in-service delivery, they need to undertake continuous training aimed at sharpening their skills and staying up to date with current trends in the field. To do so, they need to be active participants in various training options. One such training option is the Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) training, which is a program that focuses on educating individuals to work as volunteers in their local areas in the instance of a disaster (Ossey et al., 2017). The program equips individuals with basic disaster preparedness and response skills to create professional responders.