title: Disaster preparedness of poison control centers in the United States.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To assess the state of disaster readiness of poison control centers, a survey questionnaire was sent to all 96 institutional poison control center members of the American Association of Poison Control Centers in the US, both certified and noncertified programs.
  
  
  METHODS
  The data reported are the results and responses from 76 of 96 (79.2%) poison control centers.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Fifty-four percent of responding centers have written disaster plans, with 25% having drills to practice the plans. Of the centers that do not have a written plan, the majority have policies and procedures in place to address physical plant damage, increased phone traffic, loss of phone systems and malfunction of computers. Eighty-six percent of respondents have a back up generator, and 82% have an uninterruptable power supply in place. Fifty-four percent have a back up phone system and 33% have cellular phone capacity. Forty-six percent of responding centers have arrangements with other agencies in the event of a disaster. Only half of the managing directors of the responding centers believe their center can meet the public's needs in the event of a disaster.
authors.affiliation: University of California, San Diego Medical Center, 92103-8676, USA.
authors.forename: G M
authors.initials: GM
authors.lastname: Vilke
authors.forename: I
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Jacoby
authors.forename: A S
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Manoguerra
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Clark
mesh_terms: D004189:Disaster Planning / Q000592:standards*; D011211:Electric Power Supplies; D011039:Poison Control Centers / Q000592:standards*; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013689:Telephone; D014481:United States