According to a UN Report on Disaster Risk Reduction, from 2000-2019, there were 7,348 major recorded disaster events in the world, leading to 1.23 million lives lost and 4.2 billion people affected, many affected multiple times over.
Disaster medicine is a subspecialty within emergency medicine that involves a combination of clinical medicine, public health and emergency-management principles. Disaster-medicine physicians can be seen in both civilian and military response, in both Canadian and global disaster settings, and in both human-made disasters and conflict settings. They not only respond to disasters, but are often involved in all phases of the disaster cycle – preparation, response, recovery and mitigation.
The purpose of this group is to build interprofessional relationships, summarize and highlight the activities of those in the field and to give those in our community the opportunity to learn and contribute.
Since disaster medicine involves collaboration between many disciplines, we would like to extend membership in this interest group not only to the Department of Emergency Medicine’s own faculty and trainees, but also to:
- Emergency Care BC
- the Department of Family Practice (including members practising in rural locations)
- other departments and specialties within the Faculty of Medicine
- the UBC Global Health Initiative
- UBC Nursing
- paramedics, midwives and those in allied health professions
- emergency management professionals
- any other interested parties who may be external to UBC
If you are interested in becoming a member or having other inquiries, please contact disaster.medicine@ubc.ca. Interested members will be added to a UBC Disaster Medicine mailing list.