Skip to Content
United States National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health

Fact Sheet
Disaster Information Management Research Center (DIMRC)

Recognizing the untapped potential of library networks to aid in the nation’s disaster management efforts, the National Library of Medicine’s (NLM®) Long Range Plan (2006-2016) Committee has created the Disaster Information Management Research Center (http://disasterinfo.nlm.nih.gov) to help with national emergency preparedness and response efforts. Embedded within NLM’'s Specialized Information Services (SIS) division, DIMRC is tasked with the collection, organization and dissemination of health information resources and informatics research related to disasters of natural, accidental, or deliberate origin.

Historical Perspective with Disasters

NLM has a long history of providing health information during times of disaster, and has developed a number of tools and advanced information services designed for emergency responder use. NLM has provided information for the Bhopal, India gas leak, and Hurricane Mitch in Central America disasters. More recently, libraries were utilized by the public during Hurricane Katrina to access health information, information on recovery, rehabilitation efforts, tracking displaced persons, and were also utilized by the responding agencies for communication when their assets were unavailable. NLM’s Hazardous Substances Databank (HSDB®), a toxicology database, provides the framework for the Wireless Information System for Emergency Responders (WISER®) for handheld devices, a resource used widely by emergency responders to identify chemical and radiological accidents. This has also recently been used in both Louisiana after Hurricane Katrina, and in Iraq to help identify potentially toxic substances.

Research and Activities

As part of the Federal effort, DIMRC is committed to help prepare, respond to, recover from, and mitigate the adverse health effects of disasters in conjunction with Federal, State, and local governments, private organizations, and local communities. To accomplish this, several areas of research and activities have been identified:

Further Information

For detailed information about DIMRC, contact:

National Library of Medicine
Specialized Information Services
Two Democracy Plaza, Suite 510
6707 Democracy Boulevard, MSC 5467
Bethesda, MD 20892-5467
Telephone: (301) 496-1131
FAX: (301) 480-3537
e-mail: tehip@teh.nlm.nih.gov
URL: http://sis.nlm.nih.gov

For information on the NLM services, contact:

Customer Service
National Library of Medicine
8600 Rockville Pike
Bethesda, MD 20894
Telephone: 1-888-FINDNLM (1-888-346-3656)
e-mail: custserv@nlm.nih.gov
URL: http://www.nlm.nih.gov

A complete list of NLM Fact Sheets is available at:
(alphabetical list) http://www.nlm.nih.gov/pubs/factsheets/factsheets.html
(subject list): http://www.nlm.nih.gov/pubs/factsheets/factsubj.html

Or write to:

FACT SHEETS
Office of Communications and Public Liaison
National Library of Medicine
8600 Rockville Pike
Bethesda, Maryland 20894

Phone: (301) 496-6308
Fax: (301) 496-4450
email: publicinfo@nlm.nih.gov

Last reviewed: 16 April 2008
Last updated: 16 April 2008
First published: 28 January 2008
Metadata| Permanence level: Permanent: Stable Content