Utah hospitals’ Olympic preps can be terror primer
The extensive preparations by the hospitals in Salt Lake City for the 2002 Winter Olympics could be helpful to any other facility trying to beef up its disaster-readiness plans, say some of the health care leaders responsible for the massive project.
Intermountain Health Care (IHC) is the medical services provider for the 2002 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games and was responsible for any medical emergencies at the Olympics, big or small. Because the Olympics came during the war on terrorism, planners were more concerned than ever that the hospitals be able to handle a mass-casualty event. According to Mike Rawson, IHC’s director of safety and security, the hospital emergency plans in place for the Olympics were beefed-up versions of the disaster plans that have been in place for decades. "All hospitals are required to have a disaster plan in place, tested, and ready to go," he says. "These plans have been in place for many years and are continually updated."
IHC’s hospitals already had some experience that went beyond planning and drills. In 1999, when a tornado ripped through downtown Salt Lake City, IHC’s LDS Hospital received an alert from agencies to prepare for injured individuals, and the plan was put into action. Radio pages were immediately sent out to get additional personnel to the emergency room, and extra supplies and equipment were put in place prior to the arrival of the first patient. A total of 18 patients were seen in the next few hours by the emergency room staff — not a huge number of casualties, but still the incident gave the plan a real-life test.
In August 2001, Utah Valley Regional Medical Center in Provo was called upon to activate its emergency plan when 20 individuals at the Seven Peaks Water Park in Provo experienced respiratory problems from leaking hydrochloride fumes. In November 2001, the IHC sent a team of six professionals from Primary Children’s Medical Center and LDS Hospital in Salt Lake City and Utah Valley Regional Medical Center in Provo back to the Sept. 11 disaster sites in New York and Washington, DC. The team was able to visit with staff from hospitals near the sites and learn from their experience, says Ann Allen, emergency preparedness director with IHC.
"After hearing what their experience had been and seeing the disaster sites firsthand and then looking at the plans we have in place, we felt very good about our preparations," she says. "The New York hospitals did a great job in providing care, but what they found was difficulty in communicating with all the different agencies involved in the rescue. Many agencies used different radio frequencies and system, and that hampered communication."
In Utah, a new communications system, the Utah Communications Agency, has been phased in over the past several years so different agencies can now talk with each other — and with hospitals. IHC representatives visited with medical staff from hospitals in Atlanta after the 1996 bombing during the Olympics. The Atlanta hospitals recommended that if you have a good plan, stick with it and continue to train the employees to be ready to implement it when necessary.
IHC has also had representatives attend meetings for the past three years with the Utah Olympic Public Safety Command. IHC has been closely coordinating plans with local, county, and state agencies to be ready in case of an emergency situation.
"The Wasatch Front of Utah may be better prepared than other areas to deal with bioterrorism issues," Rawson says. "Several hospitals already have programs and facilities to provide treatment for chemical exposure incidents due to the proximity of the Tooele, UT, facility, which houses military chemical weapons. These programs and preparations were already in place long before the Olympics."
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