Nursing education for disaster preparedness and response.

Catastrophic mass casualty events (MCEs), such as pandemic influenza outbreaks, earthquakes, or large-scale terrorism-related events, quickly and suddenly yield thousands of victims whose needs overwhelm local and regional health care systems, personnel, and resources. Such conditions require deploying scarce resources in a manner that is different from the more common multiple casualty event. This article presents issues associated with providing nursing care under MCE circumstances of scarce resources and the educational needs of nurses to prepare them to effectively respond in these emergencies.