Building Resilient Healthcare Systems for Disaster Preparedness and Emergency Medical Response

Abstract

This comprehensive research investigates the resilience of healthcare systems in the Jeddah region of Saudi Arabia, with particular focus on disaster preparedness and emergency medical response capabilities. Despite significant investments exceeding 275 billion SAR under Saudi Vision 2030 to improve healthcare infrastructure and services, there remains a critical gap in understanding how effectively these strategic objectives translate into operational readiness during crisis situations. This study addresses a fundamental research void identified in the literature, where 68% of previous studies have focused exclusively on urban centers while neglecting peri-urban and rural healthcare facilities—a bias that creates dangerous blind spots in national disaster preparedness planning. Employing a quantitative exploratory design, this research collected data from 111 healthcare professionals across 15 diverse medical institutions in the Jeddah region, including general hospitals (73.0%), primary healthcare centers (14.4%), medical cities (7.2%), specialised centers (4.5%), and alternative medicine facilities (0.9%). The study systematically evaluated six key dimensions of healthcare system resilience: resource allocation, workforce capacity, technological integration, telemedicine capabilities, community participation, and government efforts, utilising structural equation modelling to analyse the complex relationships between these factors. The study found that government leadership represents the strongest contributor to healthcare system resilience (β = 0.886, p < 0.001), explaining 78.5% of the variance in overall resilience. This is followed closely by technological integration (β = 0.811, p < 0.001) and telemedicine capabilities (β = 0.824, p < 0.001), which explain 65.7% and 67.9% of the variance respectively. This research makes a significant methodological contribution by addressing the persistent urban bias in existing literature through a stratified sampling approach that includes urban (60%), peri-urban (25%), and rural (15%) healthcare facilities across the Jeddah region. Also, provides specific, evidence-based recommendations for enhancing healthcare system resilience that align with Vision 2030 objectives while addressing Jeddah's unique dual-risk profile of seasonal flash floods and pilgrimage-related surges. These include implementing qualification based training programs to suit the specific disaster scenarios of Jeddah, optimising dynamic resource allocation systems for surge capacity management, strengthening community engagement through culturally appropriate disaster response guides and to carry on technical integration through AI-managed future analysis.