Healthcare's Hurricane Safety & Risk Mgmt

In this paper, I am going to discuss the development of a Crisis Management Plan for the real or hypothetical health care organization; the crisis I have chosen is hurricane preparedness. The reason why I have chosen this disaster is due to the fact that I personally just have experienced this situation. I was able to experience how a hospital prepares for the disaster of hurricane Florence. The definition of emergency planning is: “Emergency planning can be defined as the process of preparing systematically for future contingencies, including major incidents and disasters.

” There are laws and regulations that need to be meant as well as a chain of command to implement the procedures throughout the health care organization.

In this paper, I am going to discuss the policies and procedures within also implementing an organized plan throughout the departments in order to instill the most effective and efficient way to establish the safety of the staff and the patients. I will also be discussing: resource management based on ethical approaches used during crisis management, issues such as patient triage or current as well as incoming patients, supply, and personnel availability, develop an authoritative chain of command for crisis management.

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I will include such responsibilities as incident Commander, Communications Officer, and other members of the chain of command for the incident.

I will discuss the importance and implementation of community communication, involvement, and coordination and the necessary policies for personnel management and safety. Include provisions for lock-down status and family communication abilities.

The resource management based on ethical approaches used during crisis management is applied through the health care organization due to the fact that if emergency measures are not implemented therefore the health care organization can result in major losses. Crisis management can be defined as: “The process by which a business or other organization deals with a sudden emergency situation.”

Resource management can be defined as: “The process of using a company's resources in the most efficient way possible. These resources can include tangible resources such as goods and equipment, financial resources, and labor resources such as employees.” The resource management consists and based their approaches on the severity of the crisis and set plans in place to ensure the safety and to refrain from as much liability as they can. “Resource management can include ideas such as making sure one has enough physical resources for one's business, but not an overabundance so that products won't get used, or making sure that people are assigned to tasks that will keep them busy and not have too much downtime.” Issue can occur during the a time of crisis and that is why there is a chain of command to prepare the health care organization of preventing issues or even panic that may occur during a crisis situation.

The chain of command consists of: The CEO is in charge of placing a plan in place and creating objectives and initiate and communicate plans throughout the hospital, the incident common post or ICP is in charge of the direction and communication of which the storm is moving and will implement the next moves that need to be made, the ics or incident command centers is in charge of the emergencies operations and organization and implementation with responding to emergencies. The administrators, management, charge nurses, stake holders and other representatives’ form meetings and conduct plans to communicate throughout the staffing in order to gain the safety and trust for all staffing and patients. In my situation, one week prior to Hurricane Florence coming to our area, plans started being put into place.

The management teams gave us three plans Plan A, Plan B and then divided us into teams, Team One, Team Two and Team Three. Plan a staffing and patients stayed at the hospital and we divided the days into three teams. Plan B was to evacuate the staffing and patients to other surrounding hospitals that would not be affected by this hurricane. Management started communicating these plans to our staffing well before the time the hurricane would arrive. The hospital made sure that there was enough supply and food and water, beds, etc. As the hurricane grew closer and bigger, management and the emergency teams decided to evacuate the hospital starting with all the critical patients and discharging patients as needed in enough time for the patients to be safe, this process took the hospital staffing two days and then the hospital was empty.

At that point they sent all staffing home, except for emergency crews and the emergency room stayed opened. The hospital had implemented very good hurricane preparedness to provide excellent care before, during and after the storm occurred. The resources that surrounded the hospital during the storm was great support through vendors, generators, security and other hospitals that were able to intake the patients to staffing. The transfer processes went smoothly due to the fact of the preparedness of the hospital committee and the continued communication throughout duration from the beginning to the end. Because of the structure and organization is the reasons all patients were transported and staff were safe.

In this next section, I am going to research the state and federal laws in the preparedness of a hurricane. The following requirements are required through the disaster preparedness for healthcare facilities in the state of South Carolina: “Step 1: All hospitals in evacuation zones, regardless of status Facility Administration should coordinate with county emergency management to understand conditions of roadways leading to and from the facility. Each facility should confirm open routes f or patient transport and emergency services i n the event of a facility fire or other secondary event. Step 2: For hospitals which are evacuated, including a shelter-in-place within 24-hours post-disaster, if road conditions allow and county approval is in place, appropriate facility staff should conduct a damage assessment of the facility. Ensure continuity of food and water supplies for both patients and staff and monitor pharmaceutical and equipment needs for patients. Step 3: If no damage is noted and full services can be offered When the facility returns to full-service following a zero-damage assessment, notify Health Regulation at t he DHEC Agency Coordination Center (ACC), Send confirmation.”

In the situation of a disaster occurring is very important that all management teams are and have the knowledge to be prepared and follow regulations and requirements of the state. The procedures that are put into place are there for the safety of the community and the patients, staff of the hospital. By following proper procedures and regulations the health care facility can run effectively and efficiently in order to implement the necessary communication needed to avoid panic. Another factor within preparation of a hurricane for a health care facility would be the risk management team. The healthcare organization could possibly be affected by risks such as: anything that can cause potential harm or liability to an organization.

Some example of potential risks would be: harassment, job related injuries, patient errors, patient safety, anything that could possibly is a potential liability. The risk management team will come in and analyze the situation and find a solution to apply in order for the particular issue not to occur again. Identifying each and every issue is very important in order to run the healthcare system with organization and structure and safety. Risk management team identities’ anything that can cause potential harm to an organization. The risk management teams will monitor the potential risk in order to produce the proper judgment and answer to the solution.

Within this process, the strategy is to ensure that all patients and healthcare workers are provided with communication and accountability in order to provide the best service and potential risk factors are being found before they night occur. The federal laws and state laws with other regulatory bodies that are implemented on behalf of the safety are for the well fair of the people, health insurance and privacy and so forth. The laws are implemented to govern the healthcare facility by implementing laws will ensure the accuracy and organizational, structural performances needed to achieve the goals of the healthcare facility. There are reasons why in the healthcare applies strict policy and procedures, with having continued training for staffing, as well as patients is due to the fact that the policy and procedures keep you within the guide lines of the laws and regulations that are necessary to follow.

For example: “The purpose of policies and procedures” are the following: Formalized, written policies and procedures fulfill a number of important purposes:
• “Facilitate adherence with recognized professional practices.”
• “Promote compliance with regulations, statutes, and accreditation requirements (e.g. HIPAA, EMTALA, CMS Conditions of Participation, and DNV/Joint Commission).”
• “Reduce practice variation.”
• “Standardize practices across multiple entities within a single a health system.’
• “Serve as a resource for staff, particularly new personnel.’
• ‘Reduce reliance on memory, which, when overtaxed, has been shown to be a major source of human errors or oversights.’

“These functions demonstrate how central policies and procedures are to the healthcare system’s patient safety program.” These laws and regulations are enforced on a daily basis and through joint commission. Joint Commission governors’ the quality in healthcare services, the patient healthcare needs with making sure all state and federal laws are abided by including safety of the patient and the hospital in a whole.

In conclusion, taking the proper measures to ensure the safety of all is very important. In any emergency you want to implement the proper policies and procedures, regulations and laws. The structure and organization is placed into effect to avoid panic and harm to the patients and staffing of the hospital. During Hurricane Florence our hospital was very organized and structure and plans were put into place and practiced. Hurricane Florence was horrifying for our areas, however due to the knowledge and communication throughout the health care facility we were able to run our departments effectively and efficiently. In conclusion of the hurricane all patients were transferred back into the hospital and were able to recover.

The implementations of these procedures are what created a structure and organized evacuation and readmit into our hospital. I am sad for our community with the loss of homes, cars, etc, however the preparation in our community is what saved our lives and I am truly thankful.