Karen Hammad

• PhD, RN, BN (Hons), Grad Dip Emergency Nursing
• Lecturer at Flinders University

Objectives In responding to a Chemical, Biological, Radiological, and Nuclear explosive (CBRNe) disaster, clinical leaders have important decision-making responsibilities which include implementing hospital disaster protocols or incident command systems, managing staffing, and allocating resources. Despite emergency care clinical leaders’ integral...

Background and Aim: Disasters occur daily around the world. As the largest body of health professionals, nurses are looked upon during a disaster for leadership, clinical assistance, and support. Nurses are at the forefront of managing disasters in their communities, yet their complex role as advanced nurse practitioners, clinicians, managers, and...

Background Providing end-of-life care to patients and their families in the emergency department (ED) is challenging, with high workloads, the busy environment, and a focus on providing lifesaving treatments to patients at odds with providing end-of-life and palliative care. Aim The purpose of this study was to investigate nurses’ experiences of p...

Background: Emergency departments (EDs) are often first to feel the intra-hospital effects of disasters. Compromised care standards during disasters eventuate from increased demands on health resources; the facilities, supplies, equipment and manpower imperative for a functioning healthcare facility. Emergency departments must understand the effec...

Introduction: The number of people dying in emergency departments (EDs) is increasing. However, EDs are not well designed or resourced for safe and effective End-Of-Life (EOL) care encounters, and there is little evidence regarding clinicians' perceptions and experiences of providing such care when the death is sudden and unexpected. Aim: This s...

Introduction Clinicians working in emergency departments (ED) play a vital role in the healthcare response to chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive (CBRNe) events. However, ED clinicians’ individual and workplace preparedness for CBRNe events is largely unknown. Aim The aim of this research was to explore Australian ED nurses...

Introduction We opened a national conference in Australia with a surprise mass casualty simulation scenario of a van versus multiple persons outside the conference venue. The purpose of this exercise was to increase awareness of, and preparation for, mass casualty incident (MCI) events for the conference delegates who were paramedics, emergency dep...

Aims: Nursing faculty members play a pivotal role in the achievement of nursing students’ learning outcomes. A broader understanding of what constitutes effective teaching is essential in order to ensure that effective learning takes place in the clinical area. This review sought to identify the most and least effective nursing faculty characterist...

Background: A black system event (BSE) is a large scale black-out where there is a loss of a major power supply. From a health perspective a BSE may disrupt essential equipment within a health service that may be necessary for providing care. There is a paucity of literature relating to BSE and their impact on emergency departments (EDs). Aim: The...

Objectives This review was conducted to explore the literature to determine the availability, content, and evaluation of existing chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) education programs for health professionals. Methods An integrative review of the international literature describing disaster education for CBRN (2004-2016) was co...

Background: The emergency department (ED) is a familiar place for the emergency nurse who spends their working days inside it. A disaster threatens that familiarity and creates changes that make working in the ED during a disaster response different from the everyday experience of working in the ED. Methods: This research reports on an aspect of...

Background: We experience our lives as a series of memorable moments, some good and some bad. Undoubtedly, the experience of participating in disaster response, is likely to stand out as a memorable moment in a nurses' career. This presentation will describe five distinct moments of nursing in the emergency department (ED) during a disaster respon...

Introduction Triage is implemented to facilitate timely and appropriate treatment of patients, and is typically conducted by senior nurses. Triage accuracy and consistency across emergency departments remain a problem in mainland China. This study aimed to investigate the current status of triage practice and knowledge among emergency nurses in Cha...

Study/Objective “In the end, we will not remember the years we spent in nursing. We will only remember the moments” (Donahue 1996). We experience our lives as a series of memorable moments, some good and some bad. Undoubtedly, the experience of participating in disaster response is likely to stand out as a memorable moment in a nurses’ career. This...

Study/Objective According to van Manen (2015), there are five existential aspects common in the lived world of all humans. These include: “relationality” which is how we relate to others; “corporeality” how we experience our body ; “ temporality” our experience of time ; “ spatiality” how we experience space; and “materiality” our experience of thi...

Aim: This review explored peer reviewed publications that measure nurses’ preparedness for disaster response. Background: The increasing frequency of disasters worldwide necessitates nurses to adequately prepare to respond to disasters to mitigate the negative consequences of the event on the affected population. Despite growing initiatives to prep...

Aim: Emergency department (ED) nurses are among the first professionals to provide care for people affected by a terror attack. Given the ever-present threat of terror attacks, as evidenced by an upward trend in incidents worldwide, this review is highly topical. The aim of this review is to explore ED nurses’ perceptions and experiences in respond...

In this review, the current status of emergency department triage in mainland China is explored, with the purpose of generating a deeper understanding of the topic. Literature was identified through electronic databases, and was included for review if published between 2002 and 2012, included significant discussion of daily emergency department tri...

Background In disaster situations, nurses may face new and unfamiliar ethical and legal challenges not common in their everyday practice. Research question/objectives/hypothesis The aim of this study was to explore Iranian nurses’ experience of disaster response and their perception of the competencies required by nurses in this environment. Rese...

Abstract: Australian nurses have been active participants in disaster assistance both within the in-hospital and out-of-hospital environment. This paper discusses the current disaster education opportunities and challenges for nurses. Additionally, various educational strategies for different cohorts of nurses are discussed highlighting the need fo...

Much of the literature about emergency nurses willingness to work during disasters has been from a non-Australian perspective. Despite the many recent disasters, little is known of Australian nurse's willingness to participate in disaster response. This paper presents findings from a study that explored nurses willingness to attend work during a di...

The type of disaster, individual demographic factors, family factors and workplace factors, have been identified in the international, multidisciplinary literature as factors that influence a person's willingness to attend and assist in their workplace during a disaster. However, it is unknown if these factors are applicable to Australasian emergen...

Emergency nurses play a pivotal role in disaster relief during the response to, and recovery of both in-hospital and out-of-hospital disasters. Postgraduate education is important in preparing and enhancing emergency nurses' preparation for disaster nursing practice. The disaster nursing content of Australian tertiary postgraduate emergency nursing...

The aim of this review was to explore the current literature about working as a nurse in the emergency department (ED) during a disaster. Nurses play an important role in caring for patients that present to the ED following a disaster. While there is a great deal of literature written about disasters and disaster response, little has been written f...

Natural disasters may lead to infectious disease outbreaks when they result in substantial population displacement and exacerbate synergic risk factors (change in the environment, in human conditions and in the vulnerability to existing pathogens) for disease transmission. We reviewed risk factors and potential infectious diseases resulting from pr...

The word ‘disaster’ for many people conjures up images of well publicized events such as 9/11 (2001), the London bombings (2005), Hurricane Katrina (2005) and more recently the Haiti earthquake (2010). For Australians, the impact of disasters closer to our shores has been felt through such incidents as the Bali bombings (2002 and 2005) and the Boxi...

Background Disaster response is an emergency nursing responsibility. Responding to disasters, however, is hazardous as terrorism, pandemics and chemical industrial accidents challenge the safety of nurses and their families. International experience has shown that nurses can become victims of disasters and that fear of contaminating family and frie...