By: Mollie Melbourne

In the midst of carving pumpkins, buying candy, and putting the finishing touches on Halloween costumes, many people from Virginia to Maine are also watching the weather closely as Hurricane Sandy makes her way northward.  It’s too soon to know exactly what weather will accompany the ghosts and goblins on Halloween, but it’s not too soon to look at your preparedness at home and at work.

Take the next few days to review your plan, make sure contact information is up to date, clarify expectations about staff coming to work, define your trigger for re-scheduling patients and closing your facility, and encourage your staff to update their personal plan.  Take a look at your emergency supplies at home and work and fill in your kit where needed.  Even if Sandy decides to treat us rather than trick us, these efforts will not be wasted.

Stay up to date with the latest forecast on the National Hurricane Center website.  And visit Ready.gov for great personal preparedness plan templates, resources for business continuity planning, and solid advice for hurricane preparedness.

By: Mollie Melbourne

September is National Preparedness Month!  As we send our children off to school and enjoy the last few weeks of summer, now is the perfect time to think about personal and organizational preparedness.  The theme for this year’s National Preparedness Month is Pledge to Prepare. Visit this website to learn about the number of easy ways that you, your organization, or your business or place of work can fulfill the pledge and become better prepared for disasters this year.  Here are some ideas about how you can help your staff, your patients, and your community prepare for an emergency:

- Provide personal preparedness plan templates in waiting rooms, break rooms,and other common areas of your health center
- Include personal preparedness on your monthly staff meeting agenda – and consider inviting someone from the local Red Cross chapter or health department to talk about the importance of being prepared
- Include information on personal preparedness in health fairs and other outreach activities
- Does your health center give away small items with your health center name on them?  Consider items related to personal preparedness this year, like pen flashlights, permanent markers, whistles, and other items helpful following an emergency
- Challenge the departments within your health center to take the preparedness pledge – and then reward the department that gets the highest percentage of staff to complete personal plans during Preparedness Month
- Share preparedness information and tips through your Facebook page and Twitter account

Have others?  We’d love to hear them.  Just email to Mollie Melbourne and we will publish them in a blog during September!

By: Mollie Melbourne

Expected to strengthen to a Category 1 hurricane and make landfall later tonight or early tomorrow, Tropical Storm Issac is churning in the Gulf Coast.  Here are some helpful tips from FEMA:

If you have not done so already, it is important to ensure you:

• Check your family’s emergency supply kit – make certain you have food, water, medications, and other necessities to sustain you, your family and family pets for at least 72 hours.
• Follow the direction of local officials – any evacuation orders come from local officials, so follow their guidance. When it comes to swimming, follow local warnings as well. Even the best swimmers can fall victim to the strong waves and rip currents caused by storms.
• Keep up to date with local conditions – follow TV and radio reports from your area, or visit www.weather.gov (http://mobile.weather.gov on your phone) for the latest forecast.
• Remember food safety – power outages and flooding may happen as a result of a tropical storm or hurricane, so have a plan for keeping food safe. Have a cooler on hand to keep food cold, and group food together in the freezer so it stays cold longer.
• Have an adequate communication plan – be sure friends and family know how to contact you. Teach family members how to use text messaging as text messages can often get around network disruptions when a phone call might not able to get through.

Keep in mind, hurricanes bring heavy rains, storm surges, and possible flooding events. Avoid walking or driving through any flooded areas – it takes only six inches of fast-moving flood water to knock over an adult and two feet to move a vehicle. Remember: Turn Around, Don’t Drown!

For those who may be in the path of Isaac, you can get hurricane safety tips right on your phone by downloading these useful apps:

• FEMA – Android, Apple, Blackberry
• American Red Cross “Hurricane” app – Android, Apple

Prepare for hazards in YOUR area

Although you may not be in Isaac’s path, now is a good time to review the potential hazards where you live. Knowing likely risks for your area, whether wildfires, earthquakes, or tornadoes, and knowing what to do when a disaster strikes is a critical part of being prepared and may make all the difference when seconds matter. Local Emergency management offices can help you identify hazards in your community and can outline the local plans and recommendations for each. And be sure to share this information with family, neighbors, colleagues and friends – talking about preparedness helps everyone be ready “just in case.” Use the links below to make your family, business and community safer, more resilient and better prepared for any disaster event.

Useful links

What to do before, during, and after a hurricane or tropical storm

• On your computer: www.Ready.gov/hurricanes
• On your phone: m.fema.gov or on the FEMA app

Latest Isaac forecast from the National Hurricane Center

• On your computer: www.hurricanes.gov
• On your phone: http://hurricanes.gov/mobile
• On Twitter: www.twitter.com/NHC_Atlantic
• On Facebook: www.facebook.com/US.NOAA.NationalHurricaneCenter.gov

Community preparedness tools and resources

• Community Preparedness Toolkit: http://www.citizencorps.gov/getstarted/toolkit/kitindex.shtm
• Citizen Corps Program: http://www.citizencorps.gov/index.shtm
• Youth Preparedness: http://www.citizencorps.gov/getstarted/youth/youthindex.shtm
• Business Preparedness: http://www.citizencorps.gov/getstarted/business.shtm
• Neighbors Helping Neighbors: http://www.citizencorps.gov/getstarted/neighborshelpingneighbors.shtm

By: Mollie Melbourne

WASHINGTON and NEW YORK – A new article titled, “An HIT Solution for Clinical Care and Disaster Planning: How One Health Center in Joplin, MO, Survived a Tornado and Avoided a Health Information Disaster,” by the Geiger Gibson /RCHN Community Health Foundation Research Collaborative at the George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services, was released today in the Online Journal of Public Health Informatics (OJPJI). It examines the experience of a community health center in the aftermath of the major tornado that swept through the American Midwest in the spring of 2011, and provides insight into key information technology planning issues, especially those related to patient records and health center data, essential to disaster survival and recovery.

Access Family Care (AFC), a community health center serving southwest Missouri at four sites, including two in the city of Joplin, sustained the May 2011 tornado that pummeled the area, devastating Joplin and the surrounding communities. Despite catastrophic damage to the Joplin area, AFC was able to continue serving patients because of its comprehensive disaster planning and robust electronic medical record (EMR) system. While other providers, including the local hospital, were nearly demolished, the center’s physical plant remained intact and the health information technology platform enabled it to play an integral role in post-disaster response and recovery, as well as the ongoing provision of primary medical and dental care to adults and children in the community.

“Few examples exist in which health centers and other safety net providers understand and plan for patients’ need to access their medical records in the wake of natural disasters.  In this instance, AFC shows that thoughtful planning, more than luck, helped ensure that their investment in HIT was secured and ability to provide essential care for patients retained.” said Peter Shin, Ph.D., M.P.H., co-author of the article and Associate Professor in GW’s Department of Health Policy.

Authors Shin and Feygele Jacobs, M.P.H, M.S., note that today, HIT initiatives are focused largely on electronic capture of meaningful clinical data, the use of data to track and improve quality, and the exchange of patient information in a structured format. However, there is relatively little attention to how CHCs and other providers should best secure their data and prepare for possible interruptions to care and information access. The authors recommend that clear guidance, based on industry best practices, be developed to help health centers plan for the information technology elements of disaster situations, and that data security be identified as a priority.

“In today’s world, it is increasingly important that we equip health centers with the  tools and information they need to ensure that they are adequately prepared for a range of scenarios  and can continue to offer vital services to the community.” said Julio Bellber, President and CEO of the RCHN Community Health Foundation. “Investing in HIT planning has short- and long-term benefits, helping communities when unforeseeable disasters strike.”

The article appears in the April 2012 edition of the Online Journal of Public Health Informatics (Vol 4, No 1), and can be accessed here: http://m1e.net/c?19574231-kP0lu6AXyWGK.%407541351-QTgxLUfJ5.R3o

By: Mollie Melbourne

The FEMA Think Tank conference call is TODAY at 2:00 p.m. EDT. Join Deputy Administrator Serino as hosts the discussion on recovery and how we can better pre-plan for disasters to allow for a more rapid, cost effective, sustainable and resilient recovery. Call-in details available at www.fema.gov/thinktank. If you’re on Twitter, follow the conversation using #femathinktank