The history of disaster nursing can be traced back to Florence Nightingale’s work during the 1954 Crimean War. Since then, nurses have continued to play an important role in every war or disaster front. Although records of these nursing activities are available, there are only a few institutions that offer education on disaster nursing activity. The work on systematization of the body of knowledge has only been started recently. Social interest in disasters is increasing following the 1995 Great Hanshin-Awaji earthquake and the ｓarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway. Against such a backdrop, the world?and Japan in particular?is seeing much innovating activity aimed at establishing disaster nursing as a science.

This COE program has conducted various research projects concerning disaster nursing in the past three and half years with the collaborations of parties in Japan and abroad. This research team, drawing the concerted effort of researchers in the field of disaster nursing, is undertaking a Delphi research to identify priority issues and research projects that should be given priority at the present stage so as to help make a evidence for new studies in the field of disaster nursing in Japan.

Lately, there have been quite a few natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods, and volcanic eruptions and man-made disasters including disputes and terrorist attacks both in Japan and abroad. The potentials for a large-scale disaster will always be confronted with us. This research team aims to make a comprehensive survey of the future as envisioned by disaster nursing specialists and researchers, to establish disaster nursing as one of the disciplines in the science of nursing, and The result of this research will give great contributions to the Asian and worldwide nursing.