Emergency Management

How healthcare leaders decide which services to sustain, expand, reduce, or suspend during a disruption The Healthcare Executive Brief What healthcare leaders need to know about security, safety, and organizational readiness A hospital can have an approved emergency operations plan, complete its required exercises, maintain an incident command structure, and still be unprepared to sustain patient care during a prolonged disruption. The problem is not always an inadequate resp

Exploring technological hazards

Looking at natural hazards in your hazard vulnerablity assessment

Gather Your Resources: Start With What You Already Know Before looking outside the hospital, begin with what is already inside the organization. Hospitals usually have far more useful risk information than they realize. The problem is that it may be scattered across departments, buried in reports, sitting in corrective action plans, or living in the memories of people who managed previous emergencies. The HVA committee’s first responsibility is to bring that information toget

After selecting the HVA committee, the next step is choosing the risk assessment tool the group will use. This decision deserves more attention than it often receives. The tool is not simply a spreadsheet used to record the committee’s conclusions. It influences the questions the committee asks, the factors it considers, and ultimately how the organization understands and prioritizes risk. In other words, the tool shapes the conversation. If the assessment only asks, “How lik

The HVA starts with the People. Not the Form

The Hazard Vulnerability Analysis is more than a form or an annual requirement. It is one of the foundation documents of a hospital’s emergency management program. When completed realistically, the HVA helps an organization identify: • Which hazards are most likely to occur • Which could create the greatest operational disruption • Where the hospital may be less prepared than it believes • Which failure points need attention before an emergency occurs The value of the HVA is