This study's aim is to discuss the difficulties experienced throughout a disaster—in this case, an earthquake—as well as acute stress response, which influences the seriousness of the stress response of the caregiving staff who suffered from the earthquake. During the 2007 Niigata-ken Chuetsu-oki Earthquake, 172 caregiving staff suffered during this experience. The authors of this paper gave written questionnaires to these caregiving staff one month after the earthquake. According to the data analysis, the staff felt uncomfortable when they could not provide proper care for their patients because of a lack of water, and they were anxious and felt uneasy about whether they could protect their patients when there were aftershocks. Regarding their own daily life, they felt it difficult to maintain sufficient food and water, frustration about not having household belongings because such things were broken or destroyed, and difficulty finding a place to sleep. Those who experienced these hardships throughout the disaster had higher acute stress response levels and their stress response a month later became more serious.

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　This study's aim is to discuss age, employment positions, and acute stress response (ASR) for nursing professionals, regardless of whether they were suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, and what made the difference regarding the seriousness of the disorder. One year and 10 months after the 2004 Niigata-Ken Chuetsu Earthquake, the authors administered written questionnaires to 824 nursing professionals at 15 hospitals in the devastated areas throughout July 2006.
　According to the analyses, the higher their ages, the stronger their ASR; examinees tended to have difficulty with re-experiencing/intrusion, and avoidance in acknowledging post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Among them, the younger they were, the more they considered retiring from their work.
　An analysis of open-ended answers showed that many nursing professionals felt mentally stressed when they were blamed or criticized for not going to work. On the other hand, many felt relieved and felt like maintaining their jobs when they were encouraged or appreciated for what they were doing throughout the disaster.

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　The Third International Congress on Neurology and Epidemiology (ICNE2013) was held in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates (UAE) on November 21-23, 2013. This congress comprised various scientific sessions on neurological disorders, including neurosurgical topics. At that congress, we presented a paper describing the Primary Neurosurgical Life Support course, a simulation-based, neuroresuscitationassociated training course for neurosurgeons. Herein, we describe the outline of ICNE2013 and our presentation.

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