Firefighters, police, and paramedics play a critical role in protecting people and property during fires, medical emergencies, terrorist acts, and natural disasters. RAND has examined the risks that emergency responders face—physical injury, traumatic stress, and hazardous exposures—and has offered guidelines to better protect them, beginning with an integrated approach to safety management that includes cooperation among local and state agencies, improved training, and careful planning.
JOURNAL ARTICLE
This study combines a text analysis of 70 after action reports (AARs) with a failure mode effects and consequences analysis (FMECA). This approach provides a mechanism to connect the AAR process with efforts to improve emergency response planning.
REPORT
This report describes a method for modeling an emergency response system; identifying how individual parts of the system might fail; and assessing the likelihood of each failure and the severity of its effects on the overall response effort.
RESEARCH BRIEF
This research highlight summarizes the findings of RAND's initial evaluation of the Cities Readiness Initiative and the program's impact on communities' readiness to conduct mass dispensing of medications and other medical supplies.
NEWS RELEASE
Non-fatal injuries to police officers, firefighters, emergency medical technicians and other public safety workers are common, but little is done to track these incidents in order to improve prevention efforts.
REPORT
Decisionmakers today largely assess emergency preparedness and homeland security "in the rear view mirror," looking at performance in actual events and responding to perceived failures. While real-world experience is important, better ways to assess preparedness prospectively will lead to better choices as to how and where to strengthen it.
PROJECT
Public safety officers have much higher incidence and cost of injuries that result in disability retirement than other public employees. RAND research helped the Commission on Health and Safety Workers' Compensation and the California legislature in their efforts to provide adequate workers' compensation and disability benefits.
REPORT
Testimony presented before the House Education and Labor Committee on September 12, 2007.
COMMENTARY
Protecting our [emergency] protectors is more than just the right thing to do; it is critical to maintaining America's capability to respond to future disasters, writes Brian A. Jackson.
NEWS RELEASE
The U.S. Army should change the way it plans for domestic emergencies — both natural disasters and terrorist attacks — to better support state and local first responders, according to a RAND Corporation report issued today.
NEWS RELEASE
April 5, 2007 news release: RAND Panel Identifies Key Components of Public Health Emergency Preparedness.
REPORT
In response to the 9/11 attacks, state and local response organizations took a number of steps to increase preparedness. Areas that still need improvement include coordination with the private sector, coordination among nontraditional partners such as public health, and expectations of the role of the military.
RESEARCH BRIEF
This research brief presents results of a survey of state and local response organizations to learn what they have done to improve their ability to respond to terrorist incidents since 9/11, how they have improved, and what still needs improvement.
COMMENTARY
Published commentary by RAND staff: Forum: Are We Prepared? Not Quite, in Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
NEWS RELEASE
April 24, 2006 News Release: RAND Study Proposes Guidelines to Better Protect Emergency Responders at Large Building Collapses
REPORT
In an effort to reduce the extent of injuries like those suffered by emergency responders at the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, RAND has proposed guidelines to better protect responders from the chemical, biological and physical hazards that exist following the collapse of large buildings.
RESEARCH BRIEF
A national survey of state and local law enforcement agencies one year after 9/11 shows that agencies have bolstered their preparedness efforts, but substantial variation exists in the approach to preparedness and the preparedness needs of local agen...
REPORT
In an effort to help develop federal guidelines for personal protective equipment used by emergency responders, this report summarizes data on injuries among emergency responders available from incidents of structural collapse (including the World Trade Center in 2001 and Oklahoma City’s Murrah Building in 1995), reviews the possible health effects of substances likely to be found in pulverized building materials, and describes the…
COMMENTARY
Published commentary by RAND staff: Prepare for Disaster in the United Press International.
JOURNAL ARTICLE
Emergency services are both a safety net and a locus for acute treatment.
COMMENTARY
Published commentary by RAND staff.
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