Improving Natural Disaster Emergency Preparedness
Are you prepared for a disaster?
Take the first step toward preparedness by building an emergency supplies kit!
In collaboration with the National Library of Medicine and the University’s Office of Emergency Management, we have prepared a comprehensive checklist to creating your own Go Kit. The essential items will sustain you for multiple days in the event of a disaster. With this resource, you’ll be equipped to respond confidently, quickly and safely to any natural disaster emergency.
Build your Go Kit and you’ll be ready to face the unexpected with resilience and peace of mind, knowing that you have the necessary supplies to keep yourself safe.
Go Kit on Exhibit!
In addition, to our comprehensive Go Kit checklist, we are excited to announce that we have a tangible example on display at the Lane library on the Savannah campus. This fully assembled Go Kit showcases the essential items and supplies recommended for emergency preparedness. We hope this real-life example provides you with a visual reference and inspiration to create your own personalized Go Kit. Don’t miss this opportunity to see emergency preparedness in action.
Emergency preparedness training for Georgia Southern students
As hurricanes and other natural disasters frequently impact Georgia, the importance of emergency preparedness and response is at the forefront of public health. The IHLA, in partnership with the director of the University’s Office of Emergency Management, developed a program to enhance natural disaster emergency preparedness and response across our campus community. This program aimed to improve health and promote awareness, preparedness, education, training, and safety coordination to enhance responses to natural disasters and local emergencies among Georgia Southern students using the National Library of Medicine resources such as MedlinePlus and National Institute of Health, Health Information.
When was the training done?
In Spring 2024, the training, sponsored by the Network of the National Libraries of Medicine (Region 2), focused on demonstrating how to access free and trustworthy public health information and creating an individualized emergency preparedness and response plan.
What were the benefits of this training?
Students learned how to:
- Access health information services and technology
- Find trustworthy and high-quality natural disaster emergency preparedness and response information
- Improve natural disasters awareness, education, response knowledge, and safety coordination
- Protect their health and reduce life and property loss
- Make informed decisions and teach others about natural disaster preparedness and response
Creating evidence based information through research practices
Effective natural disaster preparedness and response practices in the university are essential in protecting students’ physical and psychological health. For each training session, we administered pre-and post-test surveys to better understand students’ perceptions of natural disaster preparedness and response and evaluate the usefulness of our program.
Why is this research important?
The research’s results will enable IHLA and university partners to identify natural disaster preparedness and response indicators that are important to student safety and wellbeing. Policymakers may find this program helpful in updating successful policies and practices for natural disaster emergency planning and response. This project will also help the National Library of Medicine, the Network of the National Library of Medicine, and the IHLA in their efforts to improve public health by giving students better access to high-quality information, health-related technology, and information services that will empower them to make informed decisions.
Funding Statement:
Developed resources reported on this website are supported by the National Library of Medicine (NLM), National Institutes of Health (NIH) under cooperative agreement number UG4LM013736. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.
Please contact us if you are interested in learning more about this project or if you would like us to provide emergency preparedness training for your organization.
Last updated: 4/29/2024
Institute for Health Logistics & Analytics • P.O. Box 8110 Statesboro, GA 30460 • 912-478-0302 • ihla@georgiasouthern.edu
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