November 6, 2013 East Grand Division Healthcare Coalition Exercise:
Background:
· The East Tennessee Healthcare Coalition assists the health care community and other emergency response agencies to jointly prepare for, respond to and recover from disaster events by supporting collaborative planning and information sharing among a broad range of healthcare partners in order to protect, promote, and improve the health and prosperity of the people in Tennessee.
· Exercise Description: The East Grand Division Healthcare Coalition Full Scale Exercise was a full-scale exercise (FSE) designed to establish a learning environment for players to exercise emergency response plans, policies, and procedures as they pertain to a Natural Disaster and CBRNE event significant enough to warrant a hospital surge of patients, the activation of participating agencies’ Emergency Operations Centers (EOC), and Regional Medical Communications Centers (RMCC)
· Purpose: The exercise tested the region’s hospitals and surge plans, as well as mass causality plans and proved the importance of preparedness and response when participating hospitals have the ability to work together and activate their surge plans, reflecting the critical and life- saving value and impact that preparedness and response training provides
Exercise:
· Scenario: The scenario involved two coordinated explosions at a very large gathering of people in Knoxville, Tennessee. Many people sustained direct injuries from the explosions, and many more were injured during the rush to exit the venue. Victims from the explosion had varying level of traumatic injuries including blast, burn, shrapnel, and crush injuries. There were also many worried well people and frantic family members searching for their loved ones. Due to the number of victims, hospitals throughout the East Grand Division received patients. Many victims were transported without identification. It was designed to quickly deplete hospital resources. Family reunification was expected to be a long, complicated process.
· Recognized as one of the largest coalition level disaster drills by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
o The Coalition’s geographical area encompasses three Regional Healthcare Coalitions, representing 35 Counties from East Tennessee (Northeast/Sullivan County, East/Knox County, and Southeast/Hamilton County). The following counties represent Northeast/Sullivan County Healthcare Coalition: Hancock, Hawkins, Sullivan, Johnson, Carter, Washington, Unicoi, and Greene. The East/Knox Healthcare Coalition is comprised of Scott, Campbell, Claiborne, Hamblen, Grainger, Union, Morgan, Anderson, Jefferson, Cocke, Knox, Roane, Loudon, Blount, Sevier, and Monroe counties. And, the Southeast/Hamilton County Healthcare Coalition is made up of McMinn, Meigs, Rhea, Bledsoe, Grundy, Sequatchie, Hamilton, Bradley, Polk, Franklin, and Marion counties.
o Planning jurisdiction covers over 2 million Tennessee Residents
· Fifty-four participating hospitals across Eastern Tennessee
· Approximately 1000 volunteers (victims)
· Approximately 4000 participants
· Objectives:
1. Evaluate the participating hospitals’ ability to process a surge of patients with varying levels of injuries.
2. Evaluate the hospitals’, RMCC, and other participating agencies use of the incident command system to manage the incident.
3. Evaluate the hospitals’ internal and external communications systems -along with the RMCC and local Emergency Operation Centers.
4. Evaluate the methods established to track both patients and staff throughout the region.
5. Evaluate the ability of participating agencies to evaluate available resources and request additional support if required.
6. Evaluate the ability of participating agencies to manage mass fatalities.
7. Evaluate the ability to rapidly activate EMS resources and communicate pre-hospital needs.
8. Evaluate the participating hospitals’ capabilities to effectively detect and decontaminate patients who may have been exposed to dangerous substances.
Lessons Learned:
1. Great opportunity for relationship building
2. Demonstrated the ability to work together across jurisdictions
3. Understanding of each other’s resource capabilities
4. Proved the participating hospitals’ ability to activate their surge plans in response to a large mass casualty event
5. Communication methods in place were successful (RMCC, HRTS, etc)
6. Patient tracking systems worked well in both metro and rural areas