Resource Requirements in a Burn Mass Casualty Event

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

In general, this is a good paper. The importance of the topic is certainly valid in the burn care disaster preparedness world. The introduction and background for burn mass casualties omits or misses an opportunity to offer the reader a better overview of the impact a BMCI can have on a center/personnel/supplies.  There are other examples of BMCIs from Europe to America to Asia over the past 20 years, which offer various examples of how chaotic a BMCI can be and how your work could better contribute to offering quantitative values in future planning for supplies and personnel. While you limit the space aspect to your center, that's okay for this paper. (referring to the three key components of surge; space, staff, supplies with an overarching role of systems). 

Strengths

I like how the tables were used and how they offer a complete image of the methods used to reach these results. I foresee a final version of this paper as being a critical resource for disaster researchers looking to better understand the supply and staff side requirements in the face of a BMCI. 

Weaknesses

As a professor who teaches research methods, I'd not accept a paper of this size and importance with only 12 sources. Surely you reviewed more of the relevant literature before developing this work. If not, you should have and if so, you should cite it. Either way, what you have here falls well short from my perspective. 

A couple of examples:

While you note that ChatGPT was used in the manuscript, I'd include it in the reference section. In academia, we are all struggling with whether we use it, how we use it, and if we use it, what the limits, citations, etc. are. While (at least to me) this is not a big problem, I'd at least cite it and include the prompts you used in a table. 

The 2005 Saffle et al. paper has been superseded by later editions: Taylor et al. 2014 (ver 2), and Kearns et al. 2020 (ver 3), the current edition used by the ABA. 

Hick et al. 2012 is a good source for scarce resources to include mass burn events (or BMCIs)

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to the EBJ for review. I found this manuscript interesting and well written. I have the following comments and questions:

1. What is your hospital's surge capacity in cases of mass casuality events? I understand that your capacity for major burns is 8, but how many burns you can take in total? Can you take smaller burns?

2. What happens if there are more patients (>16) that can be managed between the two burn units in Sweden?  Do you have transfer agreements with burn centers outside of Sweden?

3. Do the authors feel that the shortened work week effects patient care or continuity of care? 

4. I would recommend addressing the first two questions i had for the authors in the manuscript.

Author Response

Please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf