Hospital Staff Shortage after the 2011 Triple Disaster in Fukushima, Japan-An Earthquake, Tsunamis, and Nuclear Power Plant Accident: A Case of the Soso District

• Published in: PloS one 2016-10, Vol.11 (10), p.e0164952-e0164952
• Main Authors: Ochi, Sae, Tsubokura, Masaharu, Kato, Shigeaki, Iwamoto, Shuichi, Ogata, Shinichi, Morita, Tomohiro, Hori, Arinobu, Oikawa, Tomoyoshi, Kikuchi, Antoku, Watanabe, Zenjiro, Kanazawa, Yukio, Kumakawa, Hiromi, Kuma, Yoshinobu, Kumakura, Tetsuo, Inomata, Yoshimitsu, Kami, Masahiro, Shineha, Ryuzaburo, Saito, Yasutoshi
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Accidents; Biology and Life Sciences; Disasters; Disasters - statistics & numerical data; Earthquake damage; Earthquakes; Earthquakes - statistics & numerical data; Emergency preparedness; Fukushima Nuclear Accident; Hospital Bed Capacity - statistics & numerical data; Hospitals; Human resources; Humans; Japan; Medical personnel; Medicine and Health Sciences; Nuclear accidents; Nuclear accidents & safety; Nuclear energy; Nuclear power; Nuclear power plants; People and Places; Personnel, Hospital - statistics & numerical data; Personnel, Hospital - supply & distribution; Physical Sciences; Radiation; Radiation (Physics); Radiation effects; Seismic activity; Seismology; Shortages; Social Sciences; Structural damage; Time Factors; Tsunamis; Tsunamis - statistics & numerical data; Workload - statistics & numerical data
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0164952

In 2011, Fukushima was struck by a triple disaster: an earthquake, tsunamis, and a nuclear accident. In the aftermath, there was much fear among hospital staff members about radiation exposure and many staff members failed to report to work. One objective is to measure this shortage in hospital staff and another is to compare the difference in recovery by hospital types and by categories of hospital staff. The monthly records of the number of staff members from May 2011 to September 2012 were extracted anonymously from the records of 7 local hospitals in the Soso district in Fukushima. Change in the number of staff was analyzed. Staff shortages at hospitals reached a maximum within one month after the disaster (47% reported to work). The shortage of clerks was the most severe (38% reported to work), followed by nurses (48% reported to work). The shortages remained even 18 months after the disaster. After a disaster in which the damage to hospital functions surpasses the structural damage, massive support of human resources in the acute phase and a smaller volume of support in the mid-term phase appear to be required, particularly for non-medical staff.