Abstract
In the event of an incident involving the release of a hazardous chemical, first responders may decide to initiate emergency decontamination in order to remove any contaminant from affected casualties. Recent initiatives such as the UK Home Office-led Initial Operational Response Programme have introduced new evidence-based decontamination protocols that reduce the time taken to initiate the decontamination process, including an increased emphasis on rapidly removing contaminated clothing (disrobe), and the use of improvised dry decontamination methods. The current study used a series of focus groups to examine public perceptions of different decontamination interventions and responder management strategies. Results revealed that a decontamination shower was perceived to be more effective than dry decontamination methods and that a management strategy that included effective responder communication resulted in increased willingness to comply with the need for decontamination. This study demonstrates that public understanding and acceptance of novel decontamination methods such as dry decontamination may present additional challenges for first responders. Increased emphasis on effective communication during decontamination is needed. Furthermore, provision of information during the focus group study resulted in an increase in participants’ knowledge and confidence in taking recommended decontamination actions, which was maintained three months after the study. The longitudinal nature of these effects suggest that it may be possible to increase public awareness about actions to take during chemical incidents by developing pre-incident public education; however, further research is needed to examine this more fully.
Highlights
In the event of an incident involving the release of a hazardous chemical, emergency responders may decide to initiate emergency decontamination
Findings from this study provide an initial insight into how members of the public perceive Initial Operational Response dry decontamination methods, in comparison to existing methods of wet decontamination
Whilst there are some limitations to our approach which we have summarised in the Limitations section below, our findings provide an understanding of how different responder management strategies might affect public perceptions of decontamination
Summary
In the event of an incident involving the release of a hazardous chemical, emergency responders may decide to initiate emergency decontamination. Evidence suggests that providing pre-incident public education about actions to take during hazardous chemical incidents could reduce the time needed for people to take initial actions (e.g. evacuation, disrobe) [8,9,10] Such information would enable members of the public to take actions to reduce their own risk, prior to the arrival of any emergency responders; this increased speed in initiating decontamination could save lives [2]. There were four main aims: 1) to examine the perceived acceptability of different decontamination interventions (e.g. a decontamination shower, dry decontamination), and why some interventions may be perceived as more acceptable than others; 2) to examine the effect of different responder management strategies (e.g. those that emphasise respect and the provision of information, versus control-focused strategies where information is deliberately limited) on public perceptions of decontamination interventions, and the impact of public perceptions on likely public behaviour; 3)to provide an insight into how taking part in a focus group relating to incidents involving decontamination can improve public understanding of and preparedness for real incidents of this type, both in the immediate and longer terms; and 4) to use information collected from focus groups to inform the development of decontamination guidance and protocols for emergency responders
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