Collaboration

The WADEM Board of Directors is pleased to announce the opportunities for WADEM members to start a Regional Chapter or Special Interest Group (SIG), as well as how WADEM members, Chapters, and SIGs may produce the WADEM publications.

The WADEM Board also invites academic and research institutions, professional associations, government and non-governmental organizations to participate with WADEM to collaborate to produce these type of publications.

The ICN Framework of Disaster Nursing Competencies 2.0

The International Council of Nurses and the World Health Organization, Western Pacific Region published, in 2009, The ICN Framework of Disaster Nursing Competencies. This document was widely distributed and used by professional nurses and nursing educators around the globe. In 2015, led by the WADEM Nursing Special Interest Group (SIG), a review identified uses that had been made of the original competency set and psychosocial competencies that should be added to the original. As it is now nearly a decade since the original publication, and several years past the suggested additions, good practice would suggest that a comprehensive review of the full set of competencies be conducted and an ICN disaster nursing competency framework 2.0 be developed.

This 2018-2019 comprehensive review will be guided by a 13-member steering committee chaired by Kristine Gebbie, DrPH, RN on behalf of the ICN. Members of the committee represent major international nursing organizations and organizations with a special interest in disaster and emergency preparedness, including the World Health Organization; the International Committee of the Red Cross/Red Crescent; World Association for Disaster and Emergency Medicine; Sigma Theta Tau, International; World Society for Disaster Nursing; and Resolve to Save Lives.

The key target audiences for the output of this process are those members of the nursing education community concerned with pre-service preparation for professional nursing and graduate and continuing education for practicing professional nurses. As a starting point, this review will consider that the nurse who is intended to demonstrate these competencies in practice is a nurse who is licensed to practice professional nursing. A higher level of proficiency in these competencies, plus some additional ones, may be required for nurses who specialize in disaster response, either within their home institution/country or as a member of a deployed disaster team.

Nurses around the globe will be invited through the participating organizations to join a Delphi panel review via an online survey tool so that the developed work is widely representative of nursing perspectives. The goal is to present the updated competency framework in 2019.