No abstract

We conducted an epidemiological study of several neurological disorders among the Chinese aged 50 years or older on the islet of Kinmen. All participants were interviewed and examined by neurologists. From the targeted population of 5,061 individuals, 3,915 (77.4%) of them completed the evaluations. Among the 4,087 individuals with whom face-to-face contact was made, the refusal rate was 4.2%. The disorders of interest were dementia, Parkinson’s disease, essential tremor, stroke, transient ischemic attacks, and migraine. Among the 3,915 participants, 366 cases were found with 1 or more of the surveyed neurological disorders on the prevalence day, August 1, 1993, yielding a prevalence of 93.5/1,000. The purpose of this study, the general methodology, and some overall findings are presented in this communication in order to provide a common background for detailed findings on each disorder to be reported separately.

People entrapped at different heights of floors or in differently damaged buildings could have a distinct pattern of injury. Our findings may facilitate strategic approaches of patients entrapped in damaged buildings and may contribute to future training for field searches and rescues after earthquakes.

No abstract

Since the establishment of the Incident Command System (ICS), many discussions have centered on its design, using the failure or success of disaster response to evaluate the effectiveness of this system. However, even prior to implementation, there are certain pre-conditions that must be first satisfied by responders. Two major factors underlying these pre-conditions, that strongly influence the eventual design and consequent functioning of the ICS, are pre-disaster established trust and relationships. This research utilizes qualitative methods to explore the importance of pre-disaster established trust and relationships in the implementation of the ICS. Twenty-eight in-depth qualitative interviews were completed and analyzed. From looking at how ICS users make a variety of different decisions regarding the establishment of the incident command, the setting up of overall response goals and objectives, the implementation of the Incident Action Plan, the selection of new ICS leaders, and the working arrangements made with volunteers, it can be observed that relationship and trust are two very important factors that dictate the successful implementation of the ICS. Based on this analysis, three conclusions could be drawn in this research: (1) any thorough evaluation of the ICS should also include an analysis of any existing pre-conditions, (2) future ICS training should cover strategies to build relationships and trust between response organizations, and (3) additional research should be conducted to understand other factors that influence the implementation of the ICS at scene of disaster.