Hospital Mass-Casualty Disaster Management (HDM) Course

Hospital Mass-Casualty Disaster Management (HDM) prepares non-critical care healthcare professionals to augment hospital inpatient capacity, and specifically critical care capacity, in the wake of a disaster.  HDM provides participants with the core critical care knowledge and skills necessary to manage seriously ill and injured disaster victims in collaboration with critical care healthcare professionals.

The intended HDM audience includes acute care healthcare professionals such as physicians, nurses, nurse practitioners, pharmacists, and respiratory care professionals who would have responsibility for managing the surge of critically ill or injured patients. 

HDM Learning Objectives

At the conclusion of this course, participants will be able to:

1. Recognize that mass casualty events which overwhelm hospital inpatient capacity will do so by generating a large number of critically ill and injured victims.
   
2. Recognize that planning and preparing for inpatient surge capacity should include “critical care cross-training” of health professionals as a method to counter shortages of appropriate skilled and trained staff.
   
3. Recognize the major functional components of traditional critical care management.
   
4. Discuss key components of emergency mass critical care.
   
5. Discuss management of patients requiring mechanical ventilation or hemodynamic resuscitation that is relevant to one’s role and responsibilities during emergency mass critical care.
   
6. Demonstrate ability to correctly set-up and operate portable mechanical ventilators such as those maintained by the US CDC’s Strategic National Stockpile Program.
   
7. Describe correct use of personal protective equipment and recognize the levels of protection necessary for given situations.