Language: Chinese

person in rain with a blue umbrella

Emergency Preparedness

Resources and information about emergency preparedness, disaster planning, and other emergency public health alerts.

Emergency and Disaster Preparedness

Seattle-King County Disaster Preparedness Fact Sheets and Flyers
Key fact sheets with tips to help you prepare for and manage a disasters such as floods, power outages, hypothermia, and more. Many topics have additional languages.

Carbon monoxide facts in multiple languages - King County
Particularly relevant to refugee and immigrant populations is the issue of carbon monoxide poisoning when there are power outages. This is a link to carbon monoxide facts in multiple languages.

Lost In Translation - Minnesota Medicine
A short article about a Karen refugee family from Burma, and how a simple lesson about our emergency system might have saved a life.

Prepare Yourself - Seattle Office of Emergency Management
The Seattle Office of Emergency Management has prepared information to learn how to plan for personal and family safety and needs. Infographics are translated into Amharic, Chinese, Khmer, Korean, Laotian, Moldavian, Romanian, Russian, Somali, Spanish, Thai, Tigrinya and Vietnamese.

National Resource Center on Advancing Emergency Preparedness for Culturally Diverse Communities
A site developed by the Drexel University School of Public Health’s Center for Health Equality, with support from the HHS Office of Minority Health, to serve as a central clearinghouse of resources and an information exchange portal to facilitate communication, networking and collaboration to improve preparedness, build resilience and eliminate disparities for culturally diverse communities across all phases of an emergency.

ECHO - Minnesota Department of Public Health
Emergency & Community Health Outreach (ECHO) uses TV, radio, phone, print, web and DVD has resources to bridge the communication gap for immigrants and refugees in Minnesota, and makes resources accessible to others.  They provide resources about emergency preparedness, health and safety and civic engagement in multiple languages.

Fire Safety

Home Fire Safety - Seattle Fire Department
Fact sheets from the Seattle Fire Department with information about Basic Home Fire Safety in a number of languages:  English, Tigrinya, Amharic, Oromo, Somali, Spanish, Chinese, Vietnamese, Burmese, Hmong, Ukranian, Russian, Nepali, Lao, Thai, Cambodian.  

Community Fire Safety Advocates - Seattle Fire Department
Provides fire safety presentations in English, Chinese, Cambodian, Lao, Vietnamese, Thai, Spanish, Oromo, Somali, Amharic and Tigrinya.  Attendees learn:  The real dangers of fire; The most common home fire hazards; How to respond properly to a home fire. Use the form provided to request a Community Fire Safety Advocate presentation or participation in a community event. See also fire safety videos in Amharic, Somali and Tigrinya. 

Champion of Change

Mohamed Ali, a Seattle area Somali refugee with master’s degree in public health, has been honored by the White House as a Champion of Change for his work in the Puget Sound area.  In 2012 a severe winter storm hit the area and many people lost power.  Ali did outreach in his community to warn about the dangers of carbon monoxide poisoning from bringing generators and grills inside. Read the Seattle Times article: Federal Way man to be honored with White House’s Champion of Change award .

person in rain with a blue umbrella
Photo by Chris Yarzab (cc license).
sailboat in puget sound waters

Poor Air Quality in Puget Sound: Information and Resource Links

sailboat in puget sound waters
Photo by Michael Li (cc license).

Wildfire smoke can cause a range of health problems including trouble breathing, coughing , headaches, chest pain. 

Children, pregnant women, older adults, those with asthma, heart disease and other chronic illnesses are especially vulnerable to these health impacts.

Precautions to Avoid Negative Health Outcomes 

These include: staying indoors (if possible), limiting outdoor physical activity (such as running, walking, bicycling, sports), closing windows at home, using an indoor air filter, keeping windows closed while driving and wearing a N95 or N100 rated filtration mask (available at hardware home repair stores). 

Smoke from wildfires increases health risks for sensitive groups, including children and babies, especially those who also have asthma or other health conditions.  Pregnant women, people over 65, and those who have heart, lung and other health conditions are also at higher risk.

Please check Puget Sound Clean Air Agency website frequently for updates on air quality. Air quality can change quickly, depending on the wind.

Breathing smoky air can cause a wide range of symptoms from watery eyes and coughing to chest pain and asthma attacks. If you or someone you know is experiencing serious symptoms, contact your healthcare provider, or call 911 if these symptoms become life-threatening. 

Recommendations from Washington State Department of Health

  • Close windows and doors as much as possible. Use fans or an air conditioner (AC) when it is hot, and set your AC to recirculate. If you do not have AC and it is too hot to stay home, go to a place with AC such as a mall, library, or community center in your city.
  • Everyone should stay indoors and avoid strenuous physical activities outside.
  • Keep indoor air clean.  
  • Don’t add to indoor air pollution. Don’t use candles, food boilers, incense, or gas stoves. 
  • Don’t vacuum as vacuuming stirs up additional particles into the air.   
  • Use an air cleaner with a HEPA filter,but do not use an air cleaner that produces ozone.
  • Consider creating your own air purifier with a box fan if you cannot afford an air cleaner.
  • Make sure everyone drinks plenty of water.

Information flyers in 10 languages

Resources for everyone as well as specific information for people who are especially sensitive to smoke (English, Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, Korean, Punjabi, Russian, Somali, Tagalog, Ukrainian, Vietnamese) 

Information Flyers in 10 Languages on Air Quality

How People with Health Conditions can Protect Themselves from Wildfire Smoke

English
Spanish Translation
Video highlighting how pregnant women and children can protect themselves from wildfire smoke.

For more Information on Health Effects from Wildfires

Frequently Asked Questions on Smoke from Fires
colonoscopy icon

Colonoscopy Test Preparation with GoLytely

UW Medicine’s Digestive Health Center has created two handouts to guide patients who are taking GoLytely to prepare for a colonoscopy.

The first handout, Colonoscopy: How to prepare with GoLytely is a timeline that tells what to do 7 days before, 5 days before, 1 day before, and on the day of the procedure.

The second handout, Colonoscopy: How to prepare with GoLytely (same-day prep), is also a timeline but is for same-day prep.

Handouts are available in Chinese, English, Korean, Russian, Spanish, Vietnamese, Arabic and Japanese.

colonoscopy icon
Photo by Giorno Brando (cc license).

Brainman Pain Management Resources

In 2011, Hunter Integrated Pain Service at John Hunter Hospital and Hunter Medicare Local in Australia developed Brainman’s first film “Understanding pain and what to do about it in less than five minutes”. The video gives people who experience chronic pain access to a self-management tool that will help them manage the impacts of chronic pain on their functioning, emotions and interpersonal relationships and will help in the adherence to pain management plans.  

Visit the Brainman Pain Management Resources, to access this video:

  • Available with and without English subtitles
  • Translated or subtitled in 9 additional languages: Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Norwegian, Portuguese, Spanish). 
  • Transcript (English) available for download

The University of Washington and The University of South Australia joined the team to collaborate in producing two additional and updated Brainman videos:  

Female nurse taking blood pressure of female patient in a hospital bed

Translated Nurse-to-Patient Communication Pages – Harborview

Female nurse taking blood pressure of female patient in a hospital bed
Photo by UW Medicine

Pages developed with nurses and interpreters to aid caregivers in communicating basic information to their patients. Use of the pages requires no prior knowledge of the patient’s language, but requires that a patient be able to read and point to a written response.

These pages are not meant to be a substitute for using a qualified interpreter. Rather, they are a basic communication aid for nurses providing comfort and care to patients. For more complex communication needs, always use an interpreter.

The Greek and Polish translations have not been reviewed. Thanks to Camelia Ades, RN, MSN, MPH for contributing the Romanian translation