The Preparedness of Hospital Emergency Departments for Responding to Disasters in Iran; a Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

INTRODUCTION: Hospitals are the most important infrastructures of any society. The hospital emergency department is one of the most important wards of hospitals in response to disasters. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the preparedness of hospital emergency departments in response to disasters in Iran via a systematic review and meta-analysis. METHODS: This study was a systematic review and meta-analysis. The literature search was conducted in the national and international databases including SID, Magiran, Irandoc, Google scholar, Medline, Scopus, and ISI. Valid Persian and English keywords were used to extract articles related to the preparedness of hospital emergency departments in response to disasters. The STROBE checklist was used to evaluate the quality of the articles, and the I(2) index was used to assess heterogeneity among the studies. Statistical analyses were conducted using STATA14 software. RESULTS: In this study, 185 articles were initially recruited. Meta-analysis was finally performed on 4 articles selected based on inclusion criteria. The analysis included a total of 51 hospitals in Iran. According to our results, the mean preparedness of hospital emergency departments in response to disasters was calculated as 54.64% (95% CI = 41.15-68.13, I(2) = 0.0%; p = 0.727). CONCLUSION: The results of this study showed that the average level of preparedness of hospital emergency departments in Iran to respond to disasters was moderate to high. Therefore, planning and actions should be considered based on the guidelines and accreditation standards to enhance the preparedness of hospital emergency departments in response to disasters.