Advanced Trauma Life Support ATLS Student Course Manual 2018

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APPENDIX D n Disaster Preparedness and Response
box d-2 incident command system,
staff, and activities
Incident Commander (IC)
• Sets objectives and priorities and maintains overall
responsibility for the disaster.
• The IC is assisted by the Liaison Officer, Public
Information Officer, and Safety Officer.
Operations
• Conduct operations to carry out the Incident Action
Plan (IAP).
• Direct all disaster resources, including medical personnel.
Planning
• Develop Incident Action Plan(s).
• Collect and evaluate information.
• Maintain resource status.
Logistics
• Provide resources and support to meet incident needs,
including responder needs.
Earthquakes, floods, riots, radioactive contamination,
and incidents involving infrastructure may require an
individual hospital to operate in isolation. Situations
may exist that disrupt the community’s infrastructure
and prevent access to the medical facility. For this
reason, it is vital that each hospital develop a disaster
plan that accurately reflects its hazard vulnerability
analysis (HVA).
Hospitals should be able to deploy sufficient staff,
equipment, and resources to care for an increase, or
“surge,” in patient volume that is approximately 20%
higher than its baseline. The term surge capacity is
used in disaster plans more often than surge capability,
but the ATLS course uses the latter term because it
is more inclusive. Too often, hospital disaster plans
use surge capacity only in referring to the number of
additional personnel, beds, or assets (e.g., ventilators
and monitors) that might be pressed into service on the
occasion of an MCE. By contrast, surge capability refers
to the number of additional beds that can be staffed,
or to the number of ventilators and monitors with
qualified personnel who can operate the equipment
in caring for patients.
Finance/Administration
• Monitor costs, execute contracts, provide legal advice.
• Maintain records of personnel.
hospital command structures. All medical providers
must adhere to the ICS structure to ensure that they
integrate successfully into the disaster response.
PREPAREDNESS
Community Preparedness
Disaster planning, whether at the local, regional, or
national level, involves a wide range of individuals
and resources. All plans should involve key medical
and public health organizations in the community as
well as public safety officials (e.g., fire, police, etc.).
Special needs populations pose unique challenges
in emergency preparedness at all levels, including
the hospitals. Children, the elderly, long-term care
facility populations, the disabled (both physically
and mentally), the poor, and the homeless have
special needs in both disaster preparedness and
response activities. All disaster plans must take into
account these groups, which are often neglected in
disaster management.
Although a regional approach to planning is ideal
for managing MCEs, circumstances may require each
hospital to function with little or no outside support.
Hospital Preparedness
Hospital preparedness for disasters includes both
planning and training. Preparedness involves the
activities a hospital undertakes to identify risks, build
capacity, and identify resources that may be used if an
internal or external disaster occurs. These activities
include doing a risk assessment of the area, developing
an all hazards disaster plan that is regularly reviewed
and revised as necessary, and providing disaster training
that is necessary to allow these plans to be implemented
when indicated. All plans must include training
in emergency preparedness appropriate to the skills
of the individuals being trained and to the specific
functions they will be asked to perform in a disaster. It
is important for individuals to do what they are familiar
with, if at all possible. Cross-training of functional
capabilities is also important in disaster response.
Hospital preparedness should include the following
steps:
••
Provide for a means of communication,
considering all contingencies such as loss of
telephone landlines and cellular circuits.
••
Provide for storage of equipment, supplies, and
any special resources that may be necessary based
on local hazard vulnerability analysis (HVA).
••
Identify priorities in all four phases of the
disaster cycle.
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