Impacts of the emergency mass evacuation of the elderly from residential care facilities after the 2011 Christchurch earthquake.

Objective: The 2011 earthquake that devastated Christchurch, New Zealand, led to the closure and evacuation of 7 residential care facilities and the partial evacuation of 2 more. Altogether, 516 elderly persons were evacuated. The emergent nature of the disaster was unexpected and largely unplanned for.