Visualizing the psychosocial situation in crises and disasters: conceptualizing a multi-functional crisis information platform (CIP-PS)

Crises and disasters are becoming more frequent, long-lasting, complex, and interdependent. This can lead to negative psychosocial consequences in vulnerable population groups, increasing the need to (1) monitor psychosocial indicators and (2) make information on psychosocial topics available to decision-makers, the scientific community, and the public. In this WiPe paper, we present a way to systematically visualize, research, and document different types of psychosocial data in crises and disasters by developing a "Multi-Functional Crisis Information Platform for Psychosocial Situations", called CIP-PS. The CIP-PS has three components, i.e., an information dashboard (CIP-DAB), a research platform (CIP-REP), and a documentation (CIP-DOC) component which together help visualize, research and document psychosocial topics, such as the psychosocial situation picture in Germany. The platform is a valuable tool for presenting relevant psychosocial information in the context of disaster public health. Its strength lies in an extensive connection between the three components related to healthcare informatics.