Introduction

Abstract

Since its inception, the World Health Organization’s Emergency Medical Teams (EMT) Initiative has strived to save lives, preserve health, and alleviate suffering through inclusiveness, transparency, global cohesion, and regional adaptation of quality standards and methodology.¹ The mission of the Global EMT Initiative is to enhance the surge capacity of countries through the promotion of rapid mobilization and efficient coordination of both national and international medical teams and health care workforce to reduce loss of life and prevent long-term disability because of disasters, outbreaks, and other emergencies.¹

Over the past decade, four EMT Global Meetings have been held and serve as a platform to foster collaboration and support among the global EMT community, which consists of clinicians and non-clinical providers, Member States, and partners. The gatherings in Geneva, Panama, Hong Kong, and Bangkok created momentum for the development of a global network and proved vital in guiding the direction of the initiative.

Under the leadership of the EMT Strategic Advisory Group, the 2022 EMT Global Meeting in Yerevan convened over 500 participants from 110 countries and organizations. The event provided the network an opportunity to define a longer EMT strategy – EMT 2030 – which serves to strengthen national EMT and rapid response capacities as part of the global health emergency preparedness, response, and resilience (HEPR) architecture outlined by the 75^th World Health Assembly in May 2022.²

One of the four core objectives of the EMT 2030 strategy is to Strengthen information systems, evidence, and research. To further this objective, for the first time in 2022, the EMT secretariat introduced a research program into the EMT Global Meeting.

The overall aim of research among EMTs is to support improvement of care provided to populations affected by emergencies, and therefore further the mission and vision of the EMT initiative. Even though the adoption of an experience-based strategy has had a positive impact in the past years, there is a need for an evidence-based generalizable guidance, aiming to increase predictability of response, strengthen advanced planning, and facilitate early actions. To this end, since late 2021, the EMT Secretariat has begun compiling a Global EMT Research Agenda, including documenting innovative solutions and products, deployments of national and international teams, and lessons learned from responses. The Secretariat also launched new platforms for advocacy and information exchange among the EMT Network.

The 2022 EMT Global Meeting abstracts highlight the vast number of accomplishments that the EMT Network can and has already accomplished. From documenting the process of developing teams to modeling impact of effective responses, to demonstrating regional and sub-regional enhancements in knowledge sharing and after-action reviews of responses, there has been a wealth of experience presented in Yerevan. It is our pleasure to present them here.

We look forward to strengthening the evidence base for EMT preparedness and response, with many of these abstracts developed further into manuscripts and more research to come.