Effectiveness of the educational-operational intervention of the crisis management in earthquake simulation conditions in prehospital emergency personnel: a randomized controlled trial study.

INTRODUCTION

Earthquakes are recognized as one of the most dangerous and destructive types of natural disasters. Therefore, decision-making and crisis management are of great importance in these circumstances. The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of the crisis management training intervention in earthquake simulation conditions in prehospital emergency and incident management center personnel in Chaharmahal Bakhtiari, Iran in 2024.

METHODOLOGY

The present study was a semi-experimental pre-test-post-test type. The statistical population was 64 emergency medical personnel at emergency bases in Iran, who were selected from the study population by simple random method and according to the inclusion criteria and were randomly assigned to two intervention and control groups based on a lottery. The educational-operational intervention program was presented to the intervention group in four two-hour sessions. A crisis management questionnaire was used to collect data. Data were analyzed using SPSS26 software, t-test, and structural equation modeling.

RESULTS

The mean age of the participants was 38.6±1.33. The crisis management score before training the crisis management model in the intervention group was 37.03±3.63 and in the control group was 37.34±4.22; there was no statistically significant difference (p=0.761). The crisis management score after training the crisis management model in the intervention group was 43.45±6.00 and in the control group was 37.91±4.31, which was statistically significant (p<0.001).

CONCLUSION

Considering the positive effect of crisis management training in earthquake simulation conditions on emergency medical personnel at emergency bases, it seems that this method can improve the performance of emergency medical personnel. Therefore, it can be suggested that crisis management training intervention in earthquake incidents with simulated training (maneuver) be used to increase the performance of emergency medical personnel.