Oklahoma Center for Prehospital & Disaster Medicine

Constitution of the Oklahoma CPDM

The Oklahoma Center for Prehospital and Disaster Medicine (CPDM) was created in 2013 to coordinate the growing efforts within the realms of prehospital, disaster, mass gathering/event, and tactical medicine around the state of Oklahoma.

In bringing together these various subspecialties, the Oklahoma CPDM facilitates collaboration across the state to further patient care, education, planning, oversight, and research in these areas. The efforts of the Oklahoma CPDM are enabled by generous support from the State of Oklahoma, the Tribal Nations within Oklahoma, the University of Oklahoma, the OU Department of Emergency Medicine, and the ACGME. The Center for Prehospital and Disaster Medicine works closely with the Oklahoma State Department of Health as well as prehospital and disaster personnel around our state.

Goals of the CPDM

The Oklahoma CPDM works to advance the art and science of the practice of EMS and out-of-hospital medicine at agency, city, regional, state, national, and international levels with the following goals in mind:

Provide medical oversight with an emphasis on direct day-to-day involvement of the physician medical directors in air and ground EMS as well as tactical and special operations medicine and disaster response
Develop evidence-based medical protocols for statewide usage
Offer continuing education featuring guest speakers and visiting professors that are experts in their field
Cultivate leadership through disaster medicine and related education, preparation, and training
Support research in the areas of EMS, disaster, mass casualty, and related fields of medical science and practice

Summary

The Oklahoma Center for Prehospital & Disaster Medicine, in its function as a major constituent of the OUDEM, plays an important and growing role in out-of-hospital and mass casualty medicine. The Oklahoma CPDM works to assure that prehospital care in Oklahoma is of the highest possible quality, through a breadth of activities ranging from medical oversight, training and education, and active response to medical and disaster situations.

Program contact: William (Bill) Justice, Associate Director of the Oklahoma Center for Prehospital and Disaster Medicine