General Information and Decontamination RulesA major event caused by an intentional or accidental spreading of chemical, biological, radioactive, or nuclear materials leading to harmful and hazardous situations for humans and the environment is termed a chemical, biological, radiation, and nuclear (CBRN) event. The pollution of a particular region, humans, buildings, soil, and water resources by exposure to CBRN materials is called contamination; the physical and chemical cleaning procedure performed with the purpose of eliminating this contamination is called decontamination (1, 2).The Hospital Disaster Management Center Presidency should, as a priority, make a joint action plan with organizations, such as the Governor's Crisis Management Center, the Provincial Directorate of Health, the Disaster and Emergency Management Authority, the Turkish Atomic Energy Authority, and the Ministry of Environment, to determine the precautions needed to be taken against exposure to CBRN materials during a disaster and should act accordingly. A separate section should be reserved for CBRN materials in the preparation of hospital disaster plans (HDPs). The chiefs of logistics and finance should ensure the supply of the necessary equipment and materials with the knowledge of the HDP president. At least two decontamination areas, one stationary and one mobile, should be built in hospitals. Every hospital should exercise CBRN drills once every two years. Additionally, agreements should be made with organizations capable of cleaning these materials when contamination occurs. The telephone numbers and addresses of these organizations should be present in the emergency communication guide (2-4).
Materials required for decontamination:• Protective clothes, gloves, caps, boots, and overshoes for personnel; • Masks preventing contamination by inhalation for personnel and portable ventilators; • Bathing compartments; • Pressurized showers or similar bathing systems; • Labels indicating contaminated and decontamination areas, together with materials, such as barriers, barricades, and strips, to prevent entrance to these sites; • Wastewater collection tanks;• Special bags, containers, and zones for contaminated equipment;
EURASIAN JOURNAL OF EMERGENCY MEDICINE
AbstractChemical, biological, and radioactive substances purposely, accidentally, or after a natural disaster cause a lot of harmful effects on people and the environment. To prevent this harmful effect or at least minimize it, precautions must be immediately taken. These kinds of incidences have different importance for hospitals as victims apply first to hospitals, and they can decontaminate staff therein. Thus, different decontamination areas should be built in hospitals.Herein we discuss the decontamination that should be applied to victims. We provide information about the effects of nuclear weapons and the first aid rules for treating victims exposed to them. A clinical sign of radiation exposure is more obvious than that for biological and chemical weapons and because it can ...