Assignment
Learning Objective
o Analyze public disaster management concepts for determining how they influence healthcare management practices.
Case
You are an emergency management professional at a regional hospital in a rural area of the American Midwest. Given its rural location, the community looks to the hospital for guidance on safe practice. As part of your hospital's public health outreach program, your supervisor has asked you to prepare a presentation for community partners, including the local fire and police departments, served by your hospital.
Instruction: Your supervisor has asked you to prepare a presentation for community partners served by your hospital that describes foundational elements of several disaster management concepts. This presentation should be styled in a way that connects these foundational concepts to their use in the healthcare field. In creating your presentation, your supervisor has asked you to address the following items:
o Hospitals and other public health entities are important to the first response in any emergency. Due to this, your supervisor has asked you to open your presentation by describing the importance of emergency preparedness to public health systems and their stakeholders.
In your description, address the following:
- Why is emergency preparedness important to public health systems and their stakeholders?
- What is an "all-hazards approach" to emergency management? Why is this approach important to healthcare providers?
- What agencies exist to assist healthcare providers with emergency management?
o Because disasters require a systemic response by a variety of stakeholders, your supervisor has asked you to describe and discuss the four stages of the disaster life cycle. In your discussion of each stage of the disaster life cycle, address the following:
- What are the primary activities at each stage and how do they relate to healthcare organizations?
- Why do these stages constitute a life cycle?
o During a disaster, it is important that there is a centralized command structure for emergency response. Your presentation should describe the components of an incident command center. As you describe these components, address the following questions:
- Which stakeholders should be included in the incident command center?
- What is the function of an incident command center for adhering to emergency response plans?
o Disasters are, by their nature, stressing even to the systems that are designed to handle them. Ensuring that any response systems maintain certain core capacities is a critical part of a disaster response plan. In your presentation, your supervisor has asked you to explain capacities for disaster response as they relate to healthcare. In explaining these core system capacities, address the following questions:
- What are the core system capacities for disaster response?
- How do healthcare organizations and community partners ensure these capacities are in place and functioning during an emergency response?
o As a critical part of the community response in any public health disaster, hospitals and emergency rooms must be equipped and prepared to handle surges in usage. In your presentation, your supervisor has asked you to define surge capacity and describe how this concept affects healthcare management. In defining and describing surge capacity, address the following questions:
- What is surge capacity? How is a healthcare organization's surge capacity assessed?
- How can surge capacity be developed and planned for throughout the disaster lifecycle?
- Which core capacities for disaster response affect surge capacity?
o Many of the community partners to whom you will be delivering the presentations will be familiar with emergency triage. However, your supervisor has asked that you define emergency triage and describe how this concept affects healthcare management for those who might be unfamiliar. In defining and describing triage, address the following questions:
- What is emergency triage and how is it used in disaster response?
- How can healthcare staff prepare for triage situations in advance of disasters?
- How should triage decisions accommodate special needs of a population?
Community Partner Presentation
Prepare a 12 to 16 slides presentation with narration and speaker notes that describes the fundamentals of disaster management concepts as they relate to the healthcare field.
Format your assignment according to the following formatting requirements:
o The answer should be typed, using Times New Roman font (size 12), double spaced, with one-inch margins on all sides.
o The response also includes a cover page containing the title of the assignment, the student's name, the course title, and the date. The cover page is not included in the required page length.
o Also include a reference page. The Citations and references must follow APA format. The reference page is not included in the required page length.