AAMC: First Contact, First Response

November 2001

Recent events mandate that the medical community reevaluate its approach to the education and preparedness of physicians to respond to biological, radiation, and chemical terrorism. The physician workforce in the United States is reasonably well prepared to respond to terrorist attacks that lead to mass casualties whose primary medical conditions are traumatic in nature. However, the workforce is not well prepared to deal with terrorist attacks that lead to medical conditions caused by biological agents, or chemical or radiation exposures. The Association of American Medical Colleges has developed an educational plan that is intended to ensure that in the future, the physician workforce will be prepared to respond appropriately to such terrorist attacks. The plan has been designed to address the preparedness of the workforce, in both the near and distant futures, by including specific educational experiences for medical students, resident physicians, and practicing physicians.

Plan Components

Medical Student Education

The AAMC will convene a panel of experts to provide guidance to medical schools on the relevant content that should be included in the medical school curriculum. The panel will:

Resident Education

The AAMC will urge medical schools and teaching hospitals that sponsor residency programs to identify and integrate immediately appropriate course work for all their resident physicians on how to respond to biological, radiation, and chemical terrorism. Appropriate education and training must be provided to resident physicians across all specialties because they may be the first contact for an afflicted patient. The Association will make educational materials available to assist institutions in developing their curricular offerings (see below).

Health Education Coalition on Bioterrorism

On Nov. 28, the AAMC will convene the representatives of medical specialty, medical education, nursing, public health and scientific organizations to develop a collective educational response to biological, radiation, and chemical terrorism. In particular, the coalition will coordinate the development of educational resources that will allow both resident and practicing physicians—who are most likely to be the first to come into contact with victims—to learn the essentials of the medical conditions that may be caused by terrorist activities. Among the resources planned are:

Partnership with CDC

The AAMC will work closely with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), under the auspices of the AAMC-CDC Cooperative Agreement, on all activities planned to ensure that the physician workforce will be prepared to deal with future biological, radiation, and chemical terrorist activities.

Medical and Public Education Experts

The AAMC will ask its member institutions to designate a faculty or staff expert to serve as liaison to the AAMC, other professional organizations, and the community for all terrorism related medical education activities.

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First Contact, First Response