ABSTRACT
<B>Introduction</B><BR>Large-scale natural disasters occur often all over the world. Japan participates in international disaster relief (IDR) operations regularly. Effective IDR medical recording procedures are very important in confusing disaster situations. IDR medical records must be succinct, only containing what is necessary. However, they must have enough information for patients' analysis and evaluation later.<BR>The authors investigated what contents are important for effective IDR medical records, and offer a proposal for a standardized record format.<BR><B>Methods</B><BR>In 2005 and 2006, the authors mailed a self-administered questionnaire to survey 51 doctors and nurses who had participated in IDR in the past about what is important for IDR medical records. The IDR Medical Record 2008 format was produced using the results. To evaluate its usefulness, the authors later interviewed 10 specialists of disaster medicine regarding their assessment of the previously proposed IDR Medical Record 2008 format.<BR><B>Results</B><BR>In the first investigation, focused on people who responded to the survey, more than half valued the following features of IDR medical records: "Well organized," "Simple and easy," "Entry language," "Easy to read," "Meets international standards," "Body diagram," "Easy symptom entry," "Durability" and "Combined with prescription." On the other hand, less than half of the participants indicated that they valued: "Compatibility with other organizations," "Electronic file," and "Combined with examination records."<BR>For the second investigation, the authors prepared the IDR Medical Record 2008 format by using the result of the first investigation. Then, the authors made the IDR Medical Record 2012 format based on the results of the interviews.<BR><B>Conclusions</B><BR>The authors proposed the IDR Medical Record 2012 format, which is a practical and effective medical record format for IDR operations.