SYSTEM APPROACH TO MANAGEMENT OF A DISASTER RESPONSE – A CASE STUDY OF TEMPORARY DISASTER RESPONSE FACILITIES FOR THE ŠKOFJA LOKA COMMUNITY HEALTH CENTRE DURING THE SARS-CoV-2

Abstract

The provision of temporary disaster response facilities can be a required response in natural or other disasters in order to address the needs of the civil citizens and/or the functioning of the rescue services within the civil protection and disaster relief system. The overstress of the healthcare and social security system during the Covid-19 pandemic raised awareness of how important provisional facilities are for providing basic human needs in natural disaster situations. Rapid decisions are essential during the state of the emergency. However, the implementation of undeveloped or underdeveloped solutions may lead to insufficient results. No guidelines or directives addressing the provision of the temporary disaster response facilities within the civil protection and disaster relief system were available at the time. Therefore, on the basis of the foreign literature and our experience, we designed a process and operational procedure for the construction of temporary disaster response facilities for the civil protection of the community of Škofja Loka. The approach and the process were evaluated and refined based on our case study of the construction of a temporary external unit of the Škofja Loka Community Health Centre during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. The final designed process is based on a systems approach and comprises seven phases, which span from the identification of needs to the implementation and construction of the solution.