Medical Response to WMD | Introduction | Medical Response System | Incident Management | Conclusion | References | Figures

The medical response system is more than first responders and medical facilities responding to an incident. It is a system of specially trained first responders, medical professionals and pre-enrolled medical facilities. The Metropolitan Medical Response System is in major metropolitan areas and regionally throughout the United States. The National Disaster Medical System is organized and activated at the national level. These systems combine to increase the national medical response to a weapon of mass destruction event.

Local First Responders

Local governments bear the responsibility for supporting its citizens. They accomplish this through a network of first responders, which are comprised of law enforcement, fire and rescue, and emergency medical services. Dependent upon how the event originated, the incident commander may vary. For events involving bombs or other violent actions, the law enforcement officials will assume the role of incident commander. Events that originate as a fire or rescue mission will necessitate the fire and rescue department assuming incident command. If the event is a pure health and medical service issue then the emergency medical service will assume incident command. In any event, each service has a defined role to fulfill. Law enforcement is responsible for scene safety and control. Emergency medical service is responsible for initial triage and emergency medical treatment. Fire and rescue department is responsible for the decontamination of contaminated patients. For the complete system to work there must be prompt recognition of a chemical and/or biological incident. All services must be able to recognize the signs and symptoms of chemical and biological patients and know the proper channels of notification.

Metropolitan Medical Response System

The Metropolitan Medical Response System (MMRS) was born of a 1995 pre sidential initiative, which funded the prototype Metropolitan Medical Strike Team (MMST). The MMST is comprised of forty-three specially trained local personnel addressed into five major functional elements: Medical Information-Research, Field Medical Operations, Hospital Operations, Law Enforcement, and Logistics (HHS, 1998). The MMST is capable of providing initial, on-site, emergency health and medical services following a weapon of mass destruction event. To enhance the importance of the MMST, the Office of Emergency Preparedness changed the name to the Metropolitan Medical Response System (MMRS). Today, forty-seven metropolitan areas have received funding for development of an MMRS (MacIntyre, Christopher, Eitzen, Gum, Weir, DeAtley, Tonat, Barbera , 2000, 242-9). The Department of Health and Human Services has set a goal of developing MMRSs for one hundred-twenty of the nations most populous metropolitan areas by the year 2005 (HHS, 1999). Capabilities of the MRS are:

Although the capabilities of the MMRS are superior to that of local first responders, activation of the MMRS is reliant upon event recognition by the local first responders.

National Disaster Medical System

The National Disaster Medical System (NDMS) is a system of three components: direct medical care, patient evacuation, and non-federal hospital beds. There is 150 Disaster Medical Assistance Teams (DMAT) nationwide, which are deployed to provide immediate medical care, mortuary support, and veterinary care. This system includes a network of pre-enrolled non-federal National Disaster Medical System hospitals located in the major metropolitan areas of the United States. These hospitals provide 100,000 pre-committed beds. As further support, federal m edical treatment facilities (military services, Department of Veterans Affairs, and HHS) are available for utilization as needed. With prompt event recognition and notification, the NDMS can deploy DMATs and supplement the incident region with medical support providers and facilities, within 12 hours (HSS, 1996).

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