[Practice of Disaster Medicine and Clinical Laboratory Tests]

In recent years, Japan has been hit by natural disasters such as earthquakes, typhoons, torrential rains, and heavy snow every year without exception. When such disasters occur, human lives are put at risk. These emergency situations are an unrivaled sphere of activity for physicians, nurses, and emergency life-saving technicians, and the need for these workers becomes the focus of society; however, for advanced rescue in the acute phase of disasters and to prevent disease onset in the chronic phase, clinical laboratory tests are expected to play a major role in developing more accurate diagnoses and promoting prompt medical care. In this paper, I examine whether clinical laboratory tests are beneficial for practicing disaster medicine.