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Background Disaster medicine is a component of the German medical education since 2003. Nevertheless, studies have shown some inconsistencies within the implementation of the national curriculum, and limits in the number of students trained over the years. Recently, the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic and other disasters have called attention to the importance of training medical students in disaster medicine on a coordinated basis. The aim of this study is to present and evaluate the disaster medicine and humanitarian assistance course, which was developed in the University of Tübingen, Germany. Methods The University Clinic for Anesthesiology and Intensive Care Medicine in Tübingen expanded the existing curriculum of undergraduate disaster medicine training with fundamentals of humanitarian medicine, integrating distance learning, interactive teaching and simulation sessions in a 40 h course for third-, fourth- and fifth- year medical students. This prospective and cross-sectional study evaluates the Disaster Medicine and Humanitarian Assistance course carried out over five semesters during the period between 2018 and 2020. Three survey tools were used to assess participants’ previous experiences and interest in the field of disaster medicine, to compare the subjective and objective level of knowledge before and after training, and to evaluate the course quality. Results The total number of medical students attending the five courses was n  = 102 of which n  = 60 females (59%) and n  = 42 males (41%). One hundred two students entered the mandatory knowledge assessment, with the rate of correct answers passing from 73.27% in the pre-test to 95.23% in the post-test ( t [101] = 18.939, p  < .001, d  = 1.88). To determine the subjective perception of knowledge data were collected from 107 observations. Twenty-five did not complete the both questionnaires. Out of a remaining sample of 82 observations, the subjective perception of knowledge increased after the course ( t [81] = 24.426, p  < .001, d  = 2.69), alongside with the interest in engaging in the field of disaster medicine ( t [81] = 7.031, p  < .001, d  = .78). The 93.46% of the medical students ( n  = 100) graded the training received with an excellent overall score (1.01 out of 6). Conclusion The study indicates a significant increase in students’ understanding of disaster medicine using both subjective and objective measurements, as well as an increase interest in the field of disaster medicine and humanitarian assistance. Whereas former studies showed insufficient objective knowledge regarding disaster medical practices as well as subjective insecurities about their skills and knowledge to deal with disaster scenarios, the presented course seems to overcome these deficiencies preparing future physicians with the fundamentals of analysis and response to disasters. The development and successful implementation of this course is a first step towards fulfilling disaster medicine education requirements, appearing to address the deficiencies documented in previous studies. A possible adaptation with virtual reality approaches could expand access to a larger audience. Further effort must be made to develop also international training programs, which should be a mandatory component of medical schools’ curricula.

The prevailing model of care for psychiatric patients in the emergency room (ER) is evaluation and disposition, with little or no treatment provided. This article describes the results of a pilot study of a family-based crisis intervention (FBCI) for suicidal adolescents and their families in a large, urban pediatric ER. FBCI is an intervention designed to sufficiently stabilize patients within a single ER visit so that they can return home safely with their families. Of the 100 suicidal adolescents and their families in the sample, 67 met eligibility criteria for FBCI. Demographic and clinical characteristics and disposition outcomes from the sample were compared with those obtained retrospectively from a matched comparison group (N = 150). Statistical analyses compared group inpatient admission rates and disposition outcomes. Patients in the pilot cohort were significantly less likely to be hospitalized than were those in the comparison group (36 percent versus 55 percent). Only two of the patients in the FBCI cohort were hospitalized immediately after receiving the intervention during their ER visit. FBCI with suicidal adolescents and their families during a single ER visit is feasible and safely limits the need for inpatient psychiatric hospitalization, thereby avoiding disruption of family, academic, and social activities and increasing use of less intrusive and more cost-effective psychiatric treatment.

Building on recent literature that addresses how social workers use knowledge to make practice decisions, this ethnographic study of mental health workers in a residential treatment center for children asks what modes of agency workers enact and how they use formal training in Therapeutic Crisis Intervention (TCI) during crises. Based on 13 months of participant observation and 36 semistructured interviews, this study demonstrates that, while workers routinely employed specific intervention techniques taught in the TCI curriculum, they rarely reported using its step-by-step decision-making process. Instead, faced with an imperative to act, workers reported using a mode of agency characterized by what they term “instinct,” automaticity, physicality, and instantaneous mental simulation of possible outcomes. I discuss these findings in light of Pierre Bourdieu’s work onhabitus, considering implications for crisis intervention training, prescriptive models of decision making, and the further development of contextually sensitive models of agency in social work practice.

Topthema: Krisenprävention und KrisenmanagementWie schnell der existenzielle Ausnahmezustand eintreten kann, hat die weltweite Coronavirus-Krise gezeigt, die nicht nur in Deutschland viele kleine und große Unternehmen in oder an den Rand des Ruins geführt hat.

This article provides an overview of restorative justice as a process and examines its relevance to women who have been victimized by physical and sexual abuse. The starting point is the justice system with its roots in adversarial, offender-oriented practices of obtaining justice. The widespread dissatisfaction by battered women and rape victims and their advocates with the current system of mandatory law enforcement opens the door for consideration of alternative forms of dealing with domestic violence. Restorative justice strategies, as argued here, have several major advantages. Like social work, these strategies are solution-based rather than problem-based processes, give voice to marginalized people, and focus on healing and reconciliation. Moreover, restorative justice offers an avenue through which the profession of social work can re-establish its historic role in criminal justice. The four models most relevant to women's victimization are victim- offender conferencing, family group conferencing, healing circles, and community reparations. Each model is examined separately from a feminist standpoint. The discussion is informed by insights from the teachings of standpoint feminist theory and social work values, especially social justice.

Behördliche Verbraucherinformationen werden von manchen als zentraler Baustein „weicher” Steuerung angepriesen, von anderen als „moderner Pranger” bekämpft. Dabei können solche Veröffentlichungen unterschiedlichen Zielen dienen. Um wirksam zu sein, müssen sie möglichst präzise auf ihr Ziel zugeschnitten werden. Dies ist auch Aufgabe des Rechts. Das heutige Veröffentlichungsrecht beruht jedoch nicht durchweg auf klaren konzeptionellen Grundlagen. Teils ist auch noch ungeklärt, wie eine zielführende Veröffentlichungspraxis rechtlich angeleitet werden kann.

Data were collected on 472 foster children at an interval of 14 months. The children's social workers, the family placement social workers and the foster carers reported on disruptions, and the reasons for placement success or lack of it. These views, combined with comments from the children, led to hypotheses about the origins of successful placements. Statistical tests of these hypotheses suggested that success depended on three aspects of the placement. First of these was the children's characteristics. Children, who wanted to be fostered (had attractive characteristics and low levels of disturbance), did better. Second were the qualities of the foster carer. Placements with warm, child‐oriented carers were more successful. Third was the interaction between carer and child. The findings emphasize the crucial importance of the foster carers to outcomes. They also support the need to pay close attention to children's views, and the potential importance of early intervention to prevent negative spirals of interaction between carer and child.

Jean Monnets berühmte Voraussage, wonach Europa in Krisen entstehen und die Summe der Lösungen sein würde, die man für diese Krisen findet, gewinnt seine Überzeugungskraft durch die Geschichte des europäischen Einigungsprozesses. Der Beitrag versucht, die Logik des »Monnet-Mechanismus« im Einzelnen zu verdeutlichen und so den oft erstaunlich unbeirrten Europäisierungstrend besser zu verstehen. Dadurch werden auch seine Grenzen deutlich. Für die Europäische Union könnte es sich als notwendig erweisen, auch über behutsame Desintegrationsschritte nachzudenken. Jean Monnet’s famous prophecy, that Europe will be forged in crises and be the sum of the solutions adopted for those crises, seems to be vindicated by the history of the European Union. The article looks into the inner workings of »Monnet-mechanism«. Identifying its components helps to understand the surprisingly steadfast trend towards integration. At the same time, the limits of this mechanism become clear. Proponents of the European Union may be well advised to also contemplate sensitive steps towards lowering the requirements of integration.

This article describes a unique use of social workers as crisis response team (CRT) members in a nontraditional host setting, municipal fire departments in Arizona. The role of modern-day firefighters has changed dramatically and now includes responding to a wide variety of crises and emergencies other than fires, such as motor vehicle accidents, family abuse, suicides, mental health incidents, accidents, and shootings. These traumatic events can lead to compassion fatigue in medically trained first responders who lack training to address the emotional needs of those involved in these crisis situations or to provide follow-up to ensure that their needs are met postemergency. Originally, CRTs were developed in these fire departments to address the needs of firefighters themselves. However, their functions have expanded to address the needs of customers served by the fire department, both at the scene and during the postintervention period. Using principles of crisis intervention and trauma theory, social workers and social work students placed in these agencies are benefiting both firefighters and community members served by the fire department.

Severe economic and financial market crises exacerbate collective action problems and thus trigger challenges to legitimacy in democracies. The article presents a typology of decision-making modes in economic policy-making in normal times and crisis times. It shows that problems of time-inconsistency in combination with high uncertainty over re-distributive implications lead to an “ad-hoc-technocratization” of economic policy-making. The separation of decision-taking from input-based legitimacy-procedures is relevant for scholars of democracy because the redistributive implications of crisis policies are high. The “democratic deficit” of crisis policies is thus not a symptom of “Post-Democracy” but of the specific context arising in an economic crisis. Ausgeprägte Wirtschafts- und Finanzmarktkrisen verstärken die Probleme kollektiver Entscheidungsfindung in Demokratien. Der Aufsatz stellt eine Typologie zu Entscheidungsmodi und Legitimation der Wirtschaftspolitik in normalen Zeiten und Krisenzeiten auf. Er zeigt, dass in Krisen wegen der verstärkt auftretenden zeitlichen Inkonsistenzen in Kombination mit hoher Verteilungsungewissheit eine „Ad-hoc-Technokratisierung“ der Wirtschaftspolitik entsteht. Die faktische Abspaltung wirtschaftspolitischer Entscheidungen vom Input-basierten Legitimationsprozess ist demokratietheoretisch relevant, weil die Verteilungsimplikationen der Krisenpolitik in der Regel sehr hoch sind. Das resultierende „Demokratiedefizit“ ist allerdings nicht als Symptom der „Postdemokratie“ zu sehen, sondern als Folge der spezifischen wirtschaftspolitischen Anforderungen im Krisenkontext.