Crossing Silos and Networking to Advance Environmental Health Disaster Research

Abstract

No change in the environment is as extreme, or often as sudden, as the change that comes after a disaster. The Disaster Research Response (DR2) Program, championed by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is an important component in understanding environmental health threats and issues following a disaster. While an increasing number of environmental health researchers are taking steps to prepare for, and to conduct, research in disaster environments, they often work in disciplinary silos, whereas the impacts of disasters are often crosscutting, impacting divergent communities, scientific disciplines, and across jurisdictional borders. Previous responses to disasters like the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill have inspired efforts to improve the nation’s capacity to perform timely interdisciplinary disaster research. Many new efforts are springing up to promote transformative collaborations in disaster research. This session will include a mix of discussions highlighting specific situations involving applied epidemiologic research or efforts to improve the process for such research to be performed. Speakers begin by explaining the importance of disaster research to environmental health. Presenters will then discuss the development and accomplishments of a new environmental health sciences disaster research community of practice and ongoing efforts to facilitate behavioral, geoscience, and environmental health disaster research. Efforts to develop international networks, as well as to foster new strategies for applied research for humanitarian crises will be presented. A discussion will include ongoing efforts to develop IRB pre-reviewed protocols, guidance, and tools to help support and expedite timely research. Additional discussions will include examples of rapid collaborations among academic institutions after a major hurricane and a recent disaster workshop that sought to reach outside environmental health to the clinical care setting to harmonize and build capacity for disaster data collection and sharing. Presenters will share experiences, case studies, and lessons learned as part of these evolving efforts. Please describe how the symposia relates to the meeting theme of Advancing Environmental Health in a Changing World. (100 words max): Disasters and accidents are an extreme example of changing environments in a changing world. In seemingly the blink of an eye, a community can be impacted by contamination, floodwaters, or wildfire smoke and suddenly be concerned about environmental exposures they never considered previously. The growing field of disaster research, championed by the NIH Disaster Research Response Program (DR2), the NSF Natural Hazards Center, Fogarty International Center, and others seek to advance transdisciplinary health research, and place environmental health into disaster response planning, for changing and challenging situations. Recent efforts, in the US and globally, to conduct disaster research and to bring together researchers have begun to advance this important field of research.