WEST PALM BEACH, Fla., Nov. 9, 2006 (PRIMEZONE) -- A tried and tested model program to improve healthcare emergency preparedness in the event of a manmade or natural disaster was launched today.
"The model program was developed over five years by a coalition of healthcare professionals in Palm Beach County, Florida, and is now thought to be the most comprehensive in the country," said HERC chair, Dr. Mary Russell.
"While other communities have come together to form a community-wide response apparatus, none rival the achievements or sustainability as exhibited by the Healthcare Emergency Response Coalition (HERC)," said Dr. Russell, Research and Organizational Preparedness Specialist at Boca Raton Hospital.
Healthcare professionals, emergency response personnel and local government in Palm Beach County have been working closely together since Hurricane Andrew in 1992 but HERC was formed after anthrax spores were mailed to the offices of AMI, the publishers of the National Inquirer, shortly after 9/11. It was the nation's first bioterrorism attack and resulted in the first fatality.
"HERC has recognized the need for sustainability, and, while its focus is still on handling short-term disasters lasting a few hours or a day or two, it has realized that it must be prepared for long-term disasters lasting several days or more, and this really does involve partnership and planning," said Dr. Russell.
"Process is the key to success, and the whole program has been very process-oriented. But from the very beginning everyone had to buy in to what was being done, everyone had to sign off on it and everyone then felt a great sense of ownership. It was that process that developed such a cohesive team," added Tenna Wiles, of Palm Beach County's Medical Society.
"We have put together an infrastructure and built such support with the hospitals -- a real working relationship that has far surpassed just the work of HERC. The implications have been very far reaching in so many areas," said Wiles. "Our hospitals not only speak with each other, they work with each other, and this is something that just doesn't happen in many parts of the country."
"They are participants in a Mutual Aid Agreement that addresses staff and resource assistance among all hospitals. Hospital representatives, along with representatives from the Department of Health and other county agencies, hold monthly planning meetings and engage in collaborative countywide training and disaster drills," she said.
HERC provides a forum for the healthcare community to interact with one another and other response agencies at a county, regional and state level to promote emergency preparedness; coordinates and improves the delivery of healthcare emergency response services; fosters communication between local, regional and state entities on community-wide emergency planning and response; ensures overall readiness through coordination of community-wide training and exercises; and promotes preparedness in the healthcare community through standardized practices and integration with other response partners.
"Our thought process right from the get go was what can we do that is best for all the hospitals, best for all first responders and best for the whole community," said Dr. Russell. "From the beginning, we realized that there had to be interoperability across the board and that meant common communications systems, joint training, shared protocols and memorandums of agreement," she said.
With seed funding and ongoing support from Palm Healthcare Foundation, HERC has developed a series of hospital protocols on preparing for and responding to any mass-casualty incident, including those that result from both terrorist attacks and naturally occurring public health emergencies.
"We train and prepare physicians and health care providers for disasters. We have taken that a step further and created SMART teams -- Special Medical Response Teams - and we are the first people in the country to have done this. We are developing our own protocols and training programs for them. The teams are able to go out into the field immediately after a disaster and set up mesh clinics quickly rather than wait for the federal government to do it, which could take days," said Wiles.
"This is important because, depending on the level of emergency, physicians' offices may be closed and patients show up in emergency rooms for non-emergency treatments. We are now able to go in and do primary care outside the hospitals and clinics. We decided we could not wait for the federal government, so we adopted the YoYo philosophy -- you're on your own. We, like all other communities, have to be able to take care of ourselves," she added.
Over the last two years, that agreement and the operational preparedness of HERC has been put to the test a number of times with several major hurricanes hitting south Florida. After Hurricane Wilma made landfall in October 2005, more than 22,000 square miles of south Florida were affected and more than 80 hospitals impacted. "Events, such as this, make everyone realize that we are all in the soup, and we all have to work together and help each other. That is what HERC is all about," she said.
A free guide "How to organize a HERC" can be downloaded from www.pbcms.org/herc.