Overall Purpose
These online MERET modules contribute to the preparation of the healthcare workforce through comprehensive competency-based modular education and training.
Overall Objective
These modules were designed to enhance the awareness and competency of Healthcare Providers and professionals and facilitate appropriate action during public health emergencies or bioterrorism events.
Target Audience:
These modules are appropriate for all healthcare providers, professionals and other members of the healthcare team who may be called upon to respond to these emergencies or disasters.
Contact Hour Accreditation Statements:
Each module is assigned contact hours based on the content and assigned readings (as appropriate).
American Nurses Credentialing Center
University of Minnesota School of Nursing, Office of Practice, Business and Professional Development is accredited as a provider of continuing nursing education by the American Nurses Credentialing Center's Commission on Accreditation.
Minnesota Board of Nursing
This program is designed to meet the Minnesota Board of Nursing requirements for continuing education. It is the responsibility of the individual nurse to determine if the course fulfills that requirement. This program expires 2 years from date completed. It is the responsibility of the individual nurse to determine if the course fulfills your State Board of Nursing requirement. Please check with your Board to insure appropriate credit.
Other healthcare providers
It is the responsibility of each participant to determine if the program meets the criteria for licensure or recertification for their discipline. Each participant will receive a certificate of attendance. Please check with your accrediting organization for complete requirements.
Click on a module to go to the module launch page:
Infection Control
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Standard Precautions and Respiratory Hygiene
This module provides an overview of Standard Precautions, which are recommendations for infection prevention and control that cover all areas of the healthcare delivery system (hospitals, long-term care facilities, ambulatory care settings, acute care settings, home care programs, and hospice programs). Standard Precautions are foundational for preventing transmission of infectious agents. They must be used for all patients at all times.
Respiratory Protection
This module provides an overview of respiratory protection, risk assessment, types of respirators, medical screening for use of respirators, fit testing, and program components. The information in this module applies to all healthcare personnel who enter the room of a patient who has symptoms of a respiratory infection that may be transmitted via an airborne route.
Protect Yourself First with Full Barrier Precaution
This module describes a stringent protocol for putting on and taking off full barrier Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). This protocol is designed to protect healthcare providers from highly contagious and life threatening diseases.
Transmission-Based Precautions
This module provides an overview of Transmission-Based Precautions, which are used in addition to Standard Precautions in situations where Standard Precautions alone may not prevent transmission. Transmission-Based Precautions for Contact Precautions, Droplet Precautions, and Airborne Precautions are described.
Multiple Drug Resistant Organisms (MDROs)
This module provides an overview of multi-drug resistant organisms (MDRO). An MDRO is a microorganism that is resistant to many antibiotics. General recommendations to prevent MDRO transmission are discussed, as well as when and why you may need to use intensified MDRO interventions.
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Applying Infection Control Principles: A Case-Based Assessment
In this assessment, you will apply the concepts you learned in the preceding MERET modules to a real world situation. After learning about Ann and Jack, a young couple who show up in an Emergency Room with flu-like symptoms after traveling abroad, you will be asked a series of questions regarding their care. Your performance on the questions is tracked.
Design and Maintenance of Airborne Infection Isolation Rooms (AIIR)
This module provides an overview of the design and maintenance of permanently engineered airborne infection isolation rooms (AIIRs). These rooms are designed to prevent the spread of easily transmitted and/or life threatening airborne infectious diseases.
Methods for Achieving Temporary Negative Pressure Isolation (TNPI)
This module provides an overview of how to create Temporary Negative Pressure Isolation (TNPI). Different methods for setting up temporary isolation (when there are no available AIIRs) are described. Temporary anterooms and methods used to isolate large numbers of patients needing airborne isolation are also described.
MDH Manual: Airborne Infectious Disease Management: Methods for Temporary Negative Pressure Isolation (PDF File)
This user guide was written by the Minnesota Department of Health in conjunction with the University of Minnesota to assist hospital personnel in the management of airborne infection isolation. |
Hospital Decontamination
| Introduction to Building a Hospital Decontamination Team
This module provides an overview of the basics of building a hospital decontamination team and how teams can be assembled in hospitals of every size. It also explores some of the standards that have been established and how to utilize those when assembling a team. This module is not intended to train you to perform hospital decontamination - it is about how to assemble the team that will be responsible for decontamination. |
Building and Sustaining Hospital Decontamination Teams
This video provides an overview of hospital decontamination and hospital decontamination teams, including personnel, roles, training, Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), supplies, program support, etc.
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Emergency Preparedness for Pregnant/Birthing Women and Newborns/Children
Pediatric Emergency Preparedness: Issues and Roles
This module is based on a presentation given on October 5, 2007 at the Minnesota Chapter of the National Association of Nurse Practitioners (NAPNAP) meeting in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The goal of this module is to raise health professionals’ awareness of emergency readiness for children.
Caring for Women Giving Birth
This module provides basic information and principles to help planners and first responders create and implement plans for providing care to women giving birth during disasters and emergencies.
Caring for Postpartum and Breastfeeding Women
This module provides basic information and principles to help planners and first responders create and implement plans for providing care to postpartum and breastfeeding women during disasters and emergencies.
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Caring for Pregnant/Birthing Women and Their Newborns During Disasters: An Introduction to the Issues
This module is a PowerPoint presentation with audio narration that is intended to increase awareness of the impact of disasters on pregnant/birthing women and their newborns and describe the healthcare needs of pregnant/birthing women and their newborns during disasters.
Caring for Newborns
This module provides basic information and principles to help planners and first responders create and implement plans for providing care to infants born during disasters and emergencies.
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Personal and Family Emergency Preparedness
Collaborative Module Development
MERET was a jointly created program of the University of Minnesota School of Nursing and School of Public Health Centers for Public Health Education and Outreach (CPHEO). This program operated in tandem with the Minnesota Department of Health Office of Emergency Preparedness. It also facilitated partnerships with various organizations, committees, associations, clinics, and hospitals to provide education and training throughout the state of Minnesota.
Funding
Minnesota Emergency Readiness Education and Training (MERET) modules were funded under grant #T01HP006412 from the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR), DHHS, Bioterrorism Training and Curriculum Development Program.
Disclaimer
The School of Nursing/MERET does not endorse any of the products shown in these modules.
Other Resources
View a master list of all websites cited in the modules.
Note: The recommendations in the Infection Control modules are based on the document "Guideline for Isolation Precautions in Hospitals," which is written and updated by the Hospital Infection Control Practices Advisory Committee (HICPAC) out of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in the US Department of Health and Human Services.
The recommendations were first formally published in 1996. The 2007 revisions to these recommendations were published recently and we are in the process of updating the modules based on the new guidelines.
Flash Plug-in Check
You need Flash Player version 8 in order to run these modules. If you don't have Flash Player version 8 installed, you will need to follow this link to download the Flash Player.
