Our research

Intensive care surge events occur when a sudden or substantial increase in critically ill patients exceeds usual service capacity and requires rapid expansion of intensive care resources. These events may arise from natural disasters, disease outbreaks, or human-caused incidents, placing extraordinary pressure on health systems and often necessitating the deployment of non-critical care registered nurses into highly specialised intensive care environments. Our research has examined nurses’ experiences of surge events to inform future preparedness planning, with a particular focus on the deployed workforce. We integrated findings from a scoping review, qualitative inquiry, Donabedian-informed evaluation, Real-Time Delphi consensus study, and an analysis of recent Australian mass casualty incidents to inform the development of a Nursing Toolkit for Intensive Care Surge Events.