Disaster Preparedness of Public Hospitals

Abstract

This study aims to determine the disaster preparedness level of hospitals in Türkiye and to determine whether the disaster preparedness of the hospitals differs according to the characteristics of the hospital, such as its ownership, role, and bed capacity. All hospitals affiliated to the Ministry of Health constitute the universe of the study. 210 hospitals were selected as the sample. The data were collected from the managers of the hospitals, or the personnel assigned by them with survey method. As a data collection form, the Turkish version of the guide named 'Hospital emergency response checklist: An all-hazards tool for hospital administrators and emergency managers' developed by the World Health Organization was used. As a result of the study, it was determined that the average score of the hospitals was 156.83±21.43. The highest average score was obtained from the command control (12.93±1.37) sub-dimension and the lowest average score was obtained from the human resources (22.48±4.80) sub-dimension. When the hospitals were evaluated according to their characteristics, it was determined that the difference between the total disaster preparedness scores according to the number of patients per day per nurse was significant.