Chung Sarita, Shannon Michael
The Center for Biopreparedness, Division of Emergency Medicine, Children's Hospital Boston, USA.
Am J Disaster Med. 2007 May-Jun;2(3):113-7.
In the event of a terrorist attack or natural disaster, large numbers of children may be separated from their families and caregivers. Many of these children will present for treatment at emergency departments or be evacuated to relocation sites. Depending on their age, some children may not be able to give their name or may be too frightened to give any information, making identification difficult. At the same time, parents will instinctively rush to hospitals to find their children. In the process, parents may unintentionally obstruct medical care, overwhelm an already stressed staff, and violate patient privacy as they frantically search for their children. Currently, there is no system in the United States that effectively expedites the reunification of children with their families when children can not be identified by healthcare or public health personnel. We propose the creation of a system that employs advanced imaging and feature-extraction technology. We envision a system in which digital images of individual children are captured as they enter a facility, with these images then being automatically transmitted and posted on a secure Web site. Features of each image, such as hair and eye color, would be automatically indexed and cataloged. With the help of trained professionals, parents could enter their child's features into the system and receive a limited set of images for identification, allowing for rapid reunification of the family. Additional advanced features of such a system will be explored. If successful, the use of such a system would address an important unmet need in pediatric emergency preparedness.
在发生恐怖袭击或自然灾害时，大量儿童可能会与家人和照顾者分离。这些儿童中的许多人会前往急诊科接受治疗，或者被疏散到安置点。根据年龄不同，一些儿童可能无法说出自己的姓名，或者因过于害怕而无法提供任何信息，这使得身份识别变得困难。与此同时，家长们会本能地涌向医院寻找自己的孩子。在此过程中，家长们可能会无意间妨碍医疗救治，让本就压力重重的工作人员不堪重负，并且在疯狂寻找孩子时侵犯患者隐私。目前，在美国，如果医护人员或公共卫生人员无法识别儿童身份，尚无有效系统能加速儿童与家人团聚。我们提议创建一个采用先进成像和特征提取技术的系统。我们设想这样一个系统：当儿童进入某机构时，拍摄其个人数字图像，然后这些图像会自动传输并发布到一个安全网站上。每张图像的特征，如头发和眼睛颜色，将被自动索引和编目。在经过培训的专业人员帮助下，家长可以将孩子的特征输入系统，并收到一组有限的图像用于身份识别，从而实现家庭的快速团聚。我们还将探索该系统的其他先进功能。如果成功，使用这样的系统将满足儿科应急准备方面一个重要的未被满足的需求。
