Terrorism: can emergency medicine physicians identify terrorism syndromes?

Abstract

Terrorism agents include biologic, chemical, or nuclear weapons used to create casualties and psychologic stress among a targeted populace and can result in significant social and economic disruption. The United States is a known terrorist target as evidenced most recently by the attacks of September 11, 2001, and the use of anthrax as a weapon against the United States later that same year. This study was designed to assess the knowledge base of emergency medicine (EM) physicians concerning terrorism syndromes, acting on the premise that EM physicians would not be able to differentiate between common biologic and chemical syndromes [1]. If gaps are found in the collective knowledge base of EM physicians regarding terrorism syndromes, future researchers and educators can develop tools to close those gaps and decrease the likelihood that a potential epidemic will go unnoticed. Terrorism is a clear threat to the health of the American public; it is critical that front-line personnel such as EM physicians be able to effectively recognize and treat the manifestations of terrorism agents [1-11]. This examination allowed the investigators to assess the knowledge of EM physicians in visually differentiating