Welcome to the Public Health and Medical (Emergency Support Function 8) Coordination Toolkit.

This toolkit is a product of the study “Making Disasters Less Disastrous”, a research project funded by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) which assessed the state of collaboration between groups responsible for public health and medical response to disasters. These included Public Health, Emergency Medical Services (EMS), hospitals/healthcare systems, and Emergency Management.

Our research has shown that while these entities desire better collaboration and coordination, a key stumbling block is a lack of awareness of the roles and responsibilities of the various players involved. Proper management of emergency and disaster events requires effective collaborative across the public health system.

This Toolkit was developed as an online tool based on survey findings and feedback from focus group discussions (FGDs) that were conducted with public health agencies, hospitals, emergency managers and EMS agencies. The overall purpose of this toolkit is to facilitate better collaboration between all entities involved in health and medical response (governmental, non-governmental, private, and public) before, during and after emergency events.

For questions or concerns please contact us.
The Office of Humanitarian Leadership and Emergency Health (OHLEH)
ohleh@utah.edu