Emergency Medicine Faculty Lead Mass Casualty Disaster Drill
Dr. Kevin Schulz, MD, EMS fellowship program director and chief of the Prehospital and Disaster Medicine section of the Department of Emergency Medicine at McGovern Medical School, led a disaster drill simulation to help prepare in the event of an emergency mass casualty situation. The mock simulation recreating a hurricane and motor vehicle accident was part of the sixth annual UTHealth Houston Center for Interprofessional Collaboration Mass Casualty Incident Simulation. The scenario training consisted of 350 participants including students, faculty, staff, and volunteers in make-up imitating injuries during the mass casualty. The training was orchestrated by the Cizik School of Nursing in collaboration with the Houston Fire Department with students from Cizik School of Nursing at UTHealth Houston, McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston, UTHealth School of Public Health, and UTHealth School of Biomedical Informatics. During each scenario, students had to triage the wounded, address blood loss, and prepare the injured for ambulance transportation.
Dr. Kevin Schulz, watched each small team of students go through the exercises followed by a group debriefing, citing what was done well, and ways to improve responses.
“Any time you see an incident that happens with multiple casualties when things aren’t essentially established upfront, and anytime you have multiple casualties, it’s going to be chaotic,” said Schulz. “Those first 15-30 minutes, when students are figuring out, creating their structure, and creating their organization are the most crucial.”
Elda Ramirez, PhD, RN, the Dorothy T. Nicholson Distinguished Professor and director of the emergency trauma nurse practitioner track at Cizik School of Nursing, and project director of the mass casualty incident drill stated the simulation is designed to acclimate students to be better equipped in handling patients from point of injury in a panicked environment to successful hospital treatment.
“Our goal is that these men and women that are health professionals from all these different areas are going to be able to jump in situations when it really does happen and that they’re going to know what to do, it’s going to become instinctual.”
Originally intended to address the mass casualty crisis as a result of 2005’s Hurricane Katrina aftermath, the mock simulation has gained notoriety for its impact. Recently it has been featured in KPRC-TV Channel 2, Houston Chronicle, KTRK-TV Channel 13, Univision Houston Channel 45, Telemundo Houston Channel 47, and Inside UTHealth.
What once had a participation count of 75 students in its first year of inception, has grown to over 300 participants. “The model for this event is now being used by other schools and fire departments to train their students and staff to be best prepared for emergency situations,” said Dr. Ramirez.