University of the Philippines Manila

SCHOOL OF HEALTH SCIENCES

Palo, Leyte

5 IDENTIFIED PROBLEMS IN EMERGENCY RESPONSE

1. Coping Strategies. Expressed that belief upon God kept them relaxed. Support
from family members and colleagues was also an essential coping mechanism.
The healthcare professionals maintained regular conversations with colleagues
maintaining social distance and tried to be benevolent with each other in their
workplace. This supportive environment helped them a great deal in reducing their
mental stress. Keeping their sacred oath in mind, they were always more
concerned about their patients than their well-being.
2. Mental Health Problems. Healthcare givers serve in an atmosphere where the fear
of infection prevails at its largest. Despite that, participants were more concerned
about family members being infected by them rather than themselves being
infected, leading to further mental stress
3. High Workload. Apart from enduring tremendous physical pressure, excessive
workload also leads to increased mental stress.
4. Lack of PPE. The PPEs provided by the authority were made of plastic-type
material. The shortage of PPE also declined to some extent with time. An
additional complaint came from the nurses that they had to face acute shortage of
PPEs as doctors were the primary focus here and the need for an adequate supply
of PPEs for nurses was relatively ignored.
5. Lack of proper disaster management processes creates a chaotic and ineffective
response and care measures. Disaster management processes begin with
identifying risks that might impact communities, families, individuals, and
hospitals.
There is no imaginable reality where accidents and emergencies cease to exist. By the
very nature of both of those terms, unplanned events occur, often requiring specialized,
curated, emergent care. These emergency response organizations work together to
perform tasks such as conducting search and rescue operations, establishing evacuation
centers, providing medical aid, distributing relief goods, and restoring essential services.
They also play a significant role in preparedness and disaster risk reduction by
conducting drills, raising awareness, and implementing measures to mitigate the impact
of disasters.