(P1-48) Rethinking the “Disaster Club” as a Student Interest Group on a Health Professions Campus

Abstract

Disaster preparedness and response requires an integrated response by all aspects of the health professions. The most successful outcome can occur when interprofessional cooperation exists between community, first responders, and the many facets of health professions. At Western University Health Sciences we have replaced our interprofessional disaster club with a disaster focused element in several other health professional interest clubs. The primary coordination is centered in the Public Health Club which is composed of students from many of our medical colleges. The public health club mirrors our community disaster response in that preventive medicine and preparedness lies in our public health program. Public health interest such as rabies prevention and education on world rabies they are centered in our public health club with support from our faculty expertise in public health. Educational components such as wilderness medicine fit well into the human emergency and critical care student group. Both human and veterinary emergency and critical care student group's natural interest lies in triage and first response. Student interest groups or clubs that focus on community outreach in medicine, nursing, dentistry and veterinary shelter medicine have a take the lead in emergency sheltering for vulnerable populations. Using the model presented here, disaster preparedness is promoted as routine extensions of daily professional endeavors. By building upon student interest groups we can build a culture of connectivity across the professions. Extending student club supported training endeavors to the community surrounding can allow the disaster responder community to meet on neutral ground. Western University Health Sciences is uniquely situated in Los Angeles County and our faculty and students reside in neighboring Orange Riverside and San Bernardino counties. At a private health professions university, our focus is to provide educational opportunities in a real-world setting which is integrated with community.