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Children's Health Care in Mass-Casualty Incidents: A Systematic Literature Review
Victor S L P Costa1, Giovanna M Stéfani1, Helio A Ferenhof2
1Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC), Department of Health Sciences, Campus Araranguá, Araranguá, Brazil.
Insights
This study reviewed pediatric health care in mass-casualty incidents (MCIs), finding that disaster response, triage, and planning are key topics. Emergency Medicine focuses on harm reduction post-MCI, with a need for more pre- and post-disaster research.
Area of Science:
- Emergency Medicine
- Disaster Health
- Pediatric Care
Background:
- Pediatric peculiarities present unique challenges in mass-casualty incidents (MCIs).
- Assisting children in MCIs requires specialized approaches within Emergency Medicine.
Purpose of the Study:
- To identify and analyze the primary topics concerning children's health care during MCIs.
- To understand the focus of Emergency Medicine research on pediatric populations in disaster scenarios.
Main Methods:
- Systematic review adhering to PRISMA guidelines.
- Searched multiple databases (PubMed, Scopus, MEDLINE/Bireme, Web of Science) updated May 27, 2021.
- Included peer-reviewed articles in English, Portuguese, Spanish, and Italian; excluded non-academic content.
Main Results:
- Analyzed 21 articles focusing on pediatric health care in MCIs.
- Identified key topics: Disaster Response (simulation, education, quality of care, technology, damage analysis), Triage, and Disaster Planning.
- Publication years, author institutions, topics, and disaster phases were cataloged.
Conclusions:
- The main topics in pediatric MCI care are Disaster Response, Triage, and Disaster Planning.
- Emergency Medicine's focus is primarily on post-MCI harm reduction.
- Further research is recommended for pre- and post-disaster phases of pediatric MCI care.
Objectives:
Considering the pediatric peculiarities and the difficulty of assisting this population in mass-casualty situations, this study aims to identify the main topics regarding children's health care in mass-casualty incidents (MCIs) that are discussed in the Emergency Medicine area.
Methods:
This systematic review was performed according to the recommendations of Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) and registered with the PROSPERO database of systematic reviews with the number CRD42021229552. The last update of the search in the databases was on May 27, 2021 and resulted in 45 documents to be analyzed. The inclusion criteria included the peer-reviewed academic papers in English, Portuguese, Spanish, and Italian languages; the databases used were PubMed, Scopus, MEDLINE/Bireme (Virtual Library of Health - VLH), and Web of Science, which execute the query on the topic, keywords, or abstracts. Also, to be included, documents that were available with full-text access through CAPES, Google, or Google Scholar. Books, non-academic research, and content in languages other than the presented ones were represented as exclusion criteria.
Results:
From the resulting papers, 21 articles served as the basis for this analysis. Revealed were the year of publication, the first author's institution nationality, topic, and disaster management phase for each study, which allow other researchers to understand the main topics regarding children's health care in MCIs.
Conclusions:
The topics regarding child's health care in MCIs found in the primary studies of this review, in order of frequency, were: Disaster Response (including the following sub-topics: simulation, education, quality of care, use of technological tools, and damage analysis); Triage; and Disaster Planning. The Emergency Medicine operation was focused on harm reduction after the occurrence of an MCI. Further studies focusing on the pre-disaster and post-disaster phases are needed.
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