Presentation Information
[ZE_VRU11-04]Building a Novel Humanitarian Support System Through Women's Leadership: A Decade of Practice with PCAT Across Multiple Disasters in Japan
*Nahoko Harada1 (1. Department of Nursing Science, Faculty of Interdisciplinary Science and Engineering in Heath Systems, Okayama University (Japan))
Keywords:
Nursing,Leadership,Humanitarian assistance,Primay Care
Background: Conventional disaster medical systems in Japan focus on acute-phase emergency care, leaving critical gaps in primary care, public health, and mental health support during sub-acute and recovery phases. The Primary Care Assistance Team (PCAT), established under the Japan Primary Care Association, was created to address these unmet needs through long-term, multidisciplinary, community-oriented response.
Practice: PCAT was mobilized within six days of the Great East Japan Earthquake (2011) and has since responded to the Kumamoto Earthquake (2016) and the Noto Peninsula Earthquake and heavy rainfall disasters (2024). Led by a nurse-scientist with expertise in disaster psychiatry and international humanitarian standards, PCAT introduced the Sphere Handbook into Japanese domestic disaster response — among the first such applications nationally — and developed integrated coordination systems spanning health, welfare, and local government sectors. A defining innovation was the institutionalization of responder support (shiensha shien) as an organizational responsibility, a dimension long absent from Japanese disaster medicine.
Research: Mental health surveys conducted across all three disaster contexts identified elevated burnout and secondary traumatic stress among volunteer responders, with distinct patterns among women. Findings directly informed PCAT's internal support protocols and contributed to national-level advocacy for responder welfare policy.
Conclusion: Women's leadership — particularly nursing expertise — was foundational to building a humanitarian response system that bridges emergency medicine, public health, and human dignity. PCAT offers a replicable model demonstrating that women's leadership in science and health is essential to constructing more equitable and effective disaster response systems.
Practice: PCAT was mobilized within six days of the Great East Japan Earthquake (2011) and has since responded to the Kumamoto Earthquake (2016) and the Noto Peninsula Earthquake and heavy rainfall disasters (2024). Led by a nurse-scientist with expertise in disaster psychiatry and international humanitarian standards, PCAT introduced the Sphere Handbook into Japanese domestic disaster response — among the first such applications nationally — and developed integrated coordination systems spanning health, welfare, and local government sectors. A defining innovation was the institutionalization of responder support (shiensha shien) as an organizational responsibility, a dimension long absent from Japanese disaster medicine.
Research: Mental health surveys conducted across all three disaster contexts identified elevated burnout and secondary traumatic stress among volunteer responders, with distinct patterns among women. Findings directly informed PCAT's internal support protocols and contributed to national-level advocacy for responder welfare policy.
Conclusion: Women's leadership — particularly nursing expertise — was foundational to building a humanitarian response system that bridges emergency medicine, public health, and human dignity. PCAT offers a replicable model demonstrating that women's leadership in science and health is essential to constructing more equitable and effective disaster response systems.
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