The Disaster Medical Support Units (DMSUs) represent a significant milestone in improving regional preparedness and response capabilities to significant multi-casualty incidents that occur in the Hampton Roads region. There are 11 DMSUs in the Hampton Roads Region. The following Hampton Roads jurisdictions and organizations have accepted the DMSUs on behalf of the jurisdiction and agreed to make them available to support the Hampton Roads Metropolitan Medical Response System (HRMMRS):
- Chesapeake
- Hampton
- Isle of Wight County
- James City County
- Newport News
- Norfolk
- Portsmouth
- Suffolk
- Virginia Beach (2 DMSUs)
- York County
In accepting the DMSU, these jurisdictions have agreed to use the equipment to augment their emergency medical response resources during a mass casualty, disaster or terrorism event as part of the HRMMRS and (when available) to honor mutual aid re-quests from other Hampton Roads jurisdictions and organizations for such equipment during mass casualty events that exceed the resources of the requesting party.
Each DMSU will support up to 250 patients depending on the nature of the injuries. Each DMSU is designed and equipped to support five functional elements of a disaster medical response: Incident Command Support, Medical Equipment Cache, Hazardous Materials Response Support, First Responder Rehabilitation Support and Mass Fatality Support. Each DMSU uses the same load plan and is equipped the same.
View the DMSU Orientation video and/or download the Disaster Medical Support Unit brochure by clicking on the document title shown next to "Download Attachments", shown below. The DMSU Inventory List is also available for download.