The occurrence of various forms of disasters has increased worldwide. In South Korea, community resilience is particularly emphasized, especially in response to large-scale disasters in regional and group units. This study investigated the association between community resilience and the quality of life of disaster-affected people, and identified the moderating effects of perception of government relief services.

Data from the third long-term survey on the change of life of disaster-affected people conducted in 2018 by the National Disaster Management Research Institute were used. The study selected 1046 participants ages ≥ 19 years from among the disaster-affected people. Statistical analyses were performed using Model 1 of the PROCESS Macro 4.0 in the SPSS program.

Community resilience positively affected disaster-affected people’s quality of life. The perception of government relief services significantly strengthened the association between community resilience and quality of life.

The study highlights the importance of enhancing community resilience to improve disaster-affected people’s quality of life and emphasizes the role of perception of government relief services in reinforcing this relationship. Several practical and political measures that focus on improving community resilience and perception of government relief services are suggested to enhance disaster-affected people’s quality of life.

This study aimed to investigate the effects of disaster trauma, disaster conflict, and economic loss on posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and to verify the moderating effect of personal and community resilience in these relationships. The data of 1914 people, aged 20 or above, who had experienced natural disasters (earthquake, typhoon, flooding) were used.

Hayes’s (2013) PROCESS macro (Model 1) was conducted to verify the moderation effect of personal and community resilience between PTSD and disaster trauma, disaster conflict, and economic loss.

Disaster trauma, disaster conflict, and economic loss were found to be positively related to PTSD. Personal and community resilience were negatively related to PTSD. Resilience had a moderating effect on the relationship between disaster trauma, economic loss, and PTSD. However, there was no moderating effect on the relationship between disaster conflict and PTSD. Community resilience had a moderating effect on the relationship between economic loss and PTSD. However, there was no moderating effect on the relationship between disaster trauma, disaster conflict, and PTSD.

The results suggest that personal and community resilience could be used for prevention and therapeutic interventions for disaster victims who experience PTSD.

Breast-feeding rates are unsatisfactory in Lebanon. Social media groups could play an important role in promoting breast-feeding in normal conditions and post crisis. The aim of this study is to identify breast-feeding challenges, facilitators and assets and to describe how community assets via social media could build community resilience to pandemic’s and disaster’s effects.

A two-phase qualitative content analysis was performed on posts and comments collected from a Facebook breast-feeding support group. Data were categorised into themes, categories and subcategories.

Posts and comments retrieved from a Facebook breast-feeding support group in Lebanon during the month of August 2020.

Group members: mothers who breastfed, breast-feeding mothers and group admins that are lactation consultants.

In phase one, breast-feeding ‘Challenges’ identified were lack of support from peers and family, lack of supportive policies, lack of knowledge and maternal stress related to political instability, COVID-19 and economic crisis. ‘Assets and facilitators’ included community support and donations. In phase two, analysis revealed how assets were being used on social media platform to build community resilience post crisis, through access to social support in challenging times, community engagement, material resources and transformative potential.

Challenges faced during breast-feeding were diminished due to the support and assets received on a Facebook breast-feeding support group, and social media has been shown to be an important community asset implicated in empowering women to breastfeed and to build community resilience in moments of crisis.

Understanding people’s perception of community resilience to disaster is important. This study explores the correlations of household livelihood assets, the adopted household disaster preparedness activities, and individuals’ assessment of community resilience.

The data was collected in 2018 by surveying a group of survivors affected by the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake in China. The CART (Community Advancing Resilience Toolkit) was used to measure individuals’ perception of community resilience, while the livelihood assets included financial, physical, natural, human, and social capitals owned by the family, and the preparedness contained 13 activities. Ordinary least squares (OLS) regression models were used to test our hypotheses.

Social capital is consistently and positively associated with the overall individuals’ perceived community resilience, while the natural, human, and financial capitals’ effects are not significant. The awareness and participation preparedness activities are positively correlated with the perceived community resilience, but the material preparedness activities are not.

Social capital and disaster preparedness activities are critical in building community resilience. Community resilience can be achieved by making the community more connected and by providing disaster preparedness interventions.

The World Stroke Organization “1 in 6” campaign aims to raise awareness that 1 in 6 persons will experience a stroke during their lifetime. With aging populations and improved survival rates, an increased number of survivors live with functional limitations and require supportive care. This has important implications for implementing an all-of-society approach to disaster risk reduction. In this study, we explore the assets that stroke survivors and caregivers consider useful in supporting their capacity to manage routine activities and independent living and to respond to a disaster.

Transcripts from interviews with stroke survivors and caregivers were analyzed by use of content analysis.

Assets were categorized into 4 classes: social, physical, energy, and personal characteristics and are presented as a household map. Emergent themes suggested that understanding how to mobilize assets is complicated yet essential for building resilience. Household resilience requires people have self-efficacy and motivation to move from awareness to action. The findings informed development of a conceptual model of asset literacy and household resilience following stroke.

Interventions to enhance asset literacy can support an all-of-society approach to disaster risk reduction through awareness, empowerment, participation, innovation, and engagement. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2018; 12: 312–320)

This study examined the role of community resilience and psychological resilience on depressive symptoms in areas on the Mississippi Gulf Coast that have experienced multiple disasters.

Survey administration took place in the spring of 2015 to a spatially stratified, random sample of households. This analysis included a total of 294 subjects who lived in 1 of the 3 counties of the Mississippi Gulf Coast at the time of both Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010. The survey included the Communities Advancing Resilience Toolkit (CART) scale, the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC 10), and the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D).

There was a significant inverse relationship between psychological resilience and depressive symptoms and a significant positive relationship between community resilience and psychological resilience. The results also revealed that community resilience was indirectly related to depressive symptoms through the mediating variable of psychological resilience.

These findings highlight the importance of psychological resilience in long-term disaster recovery and imply that long-term recovery efforts should address factors associated with both psychological and community resilience to improve mental health outcomes. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2018;12:241–248)

With the increase in natural and manmade disasters, preparedness remains a vital area of concern. Despite attempts by government and non-government agencies to stress the importance of preparedness, national levels of preparedness remain unacceptably low. A goal of commands and installations is to ensure that US Navy beneficiaries are well prepared for disasters. This especially is critical in active service members to meet mission readiness requirements in crisis settings.

To evaluate active duty Navy personnel, dependents, veterans, and retirees regarding disaster preparedness status.

The authors conducted an anonymous 29-question survey for US Navy active duty, dependents, veterans, and retirees of the Greater San Diego Region (California, USA) evaluating actual basic disaster readiness as determined by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) standards of 3-day minimum supply of emergency stores and equipment. Descriptive statistics and regression analysis were used to analyze data.

One thousand one hundred and fifty surveys were returned and analyzed. Nine hundred and eight-three were sufficiently complete for logistic regression analysis with 394 responding “Yes” to having a 72-hour disaster kit (40.1%) while 589 had “No” as a response (59.9%).

The surveyed population is no more prepared than the general public, though surveyed beneficiaries overall are at an upper range of preparedness. Lower income and levels of education were associated with lack of preparedness, whereas training in disaster preparedness or having been affected by disasters increased the likelihood of being adequately prepared. Unlike results seen in the general public, those with chronic health care needs in the surveyed population were more, rather than less, likely to be prepared and those with minor children were less likely, rather than more likely, to be prepared. Duty status was assessed and only veterans were emphatically more probable than most to be prepared.

AnnisH , JacobyI , DeMersG . Disaster Preparedness among Active Duty Personnel, Retirees, Veterans, and Dependents. Prehosp Disaster Med.2016;31(2):132–140.

We aimed to develop and test a community resilience tabletop exercise to assess progress in community resilience and to provide an opportunity for quality improvement and capacity building.

A tabletop exercise was developed for the Los Angeles County Community Disaster Resilience (LACCDR) project by using an extended heat wave scenario with health and infrastructure consequences. The tabletop was administered to preparedness only (control) and resilience (intervention) coalitions during the summer of 2014. Each exercise lasted approximately 2 hours. The coalitions and LACCDR study team members independently rated each exercise to assess 4 resilience levers (partnership, engagement, self-sufficiency, and education). Resilience coalitions received more detailed feedback in the form of recommendations for improvement.

The resilience coalitions performed the same or better than the preparedness coalitions on the partnership and self-sufficiency levers. Most coalitions did not have enough (both quantity and type) of the partner organizations needed for an escalating heat wave or changing conditions or enough engagement of organizations representing at-risk populations. Coalitions also lacked educational materials to cover topics as far ranging as heat to power outages to psychological impacts of disaster.

A tabletop exercise can be used to stress and test resilience-based capacities, with particular attention to a community’s ability to leverage a range of partnerships and other assets to confront a slowly evolving but multifactorial emergency. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2015;9:484–488)

This study aimed to learn from the experiences of well-established, disaster preparedness-focused health care coalition (HCC) leaders for the purpose of identifying opportunities for improved delivery of disaster-health principles to health professionals involved in HCCs. This report describes current HCC education and training needs, challenges, and promising practices.

A semi-structured interview was conducted with a sample of leaders of nine preparedness-focused HCCs identified through a 3-stage purposive strategy. Transcripts were analyzed qualitatively.

Training needs included: stakeholder engagement; economic sustainability; communication; coroner and mortuary services; chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosives (CBRNE); mass-casualty incidents; and exercise design. Of these identified training needs, stakeholder engagement, economic sustainability, and exercise design were relevant to leaders within HCCs, as opposed to general HCC membership. Challenges to education and training included a lack of time, little-to-no staff devoted to training, and difficulty getting coalition members to prioritize training. Promising practices to these challenges are also presented.

The success of mature coalitions in improving situational awareness, promoting planning, and enabling staff- and resource-sharing suggest the strengths and opportunities that are inherent within these organizations. However, offering effective education and training opportunities is a challenge in the absence of ubiquitous support, incentives, or requirements among health care professions. Notably, an online resource repository would help reduce the burden on individual coalitions by eliminating the need to continually develop learning opportunities.

WalshL , CraddockH , GulleyK , Strauss-RiggsK , SchorKW . Building Health Care System Capacity: Training Health Care Professionals in Disaster Preparedness Health Care Coalitions. Prehosp Disaster Med. 2015;30(2):1-8.

Community resilience (CR) is emerging as a major public policy priority within disaster management and is one of two key pillars of the December 2009 US National Health Security Strategy. However, there is no clear agreement on what key elements constitute CR. We examined exemplary practices from international disaster management to validate the elements of CR, as suggested by Homeland Security Presidential Directive 21 (HSPD-21), to potentially identify new elements and to identify practices that could be emulated or adapted to help build CR.

We extracted detailed information relevant to CR from unpublished case studies we had developed previously, describing exemplary practices from international natural disasters occurring between 1985 and 2005. We then mapped specific practices against the five elements of CR suggested by HSPD-21.

We identified 49 relevant exemplary practices from 11 natural disasters in 10 countries (earthquakes in Mexico, India, and Iran; volcanic eruption in Philippines; hurricanes in Honduras and Cuba; floods in Bangladesh, Vietnam, and Mozambique; tsunami in Indian Ocean countries; and typhoon in Vietnam). Of these, 35 mapped well against the five elements of CR: community education, community empowerment, practice, social networks, and familiarity with local services; 15 additional practices were related to physical security and economic security. The five HSPD-21 CR elements and two additional ones we identified were closely related to one another; social networks were especially important to CR.

While each disaster is unique, the elements of CR appear to be broadly applicable across countries and disaster settings. Our descriptive study provides retrospective empirical evidence that helps validate, and adds to, the elements of CR suggested by HSPD-21. It also generates hypotheses about factors contributing to CR that can be tested in future analytic or experimental research. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2013;7:292-301)