Pandemic Exercise Drill for Hospitals: Preventing Flu Pandemic Pandemonium

Learn how to create and execute a pandemic drill.

Coronavirus, Ebola, Lassa Fever, MERS, SARS, Influenza; where is the next pandemic coming from? Unpredictability is the new norm in today's threat environment. Because we are asking the wrong questions precisely, we are getting the wrong answers precisely; and as a result, we are creating false positives. Unless we change the decision making paradigm, we will continue to get false positives and find ourselves reacting to events and suffering the consequences of bad decision making. Disruptive events are occurring with increased frequency and can sometimes be extremely difficult to predict; with the potential to have significant, long lasting impacts. Conducting periodic exercises, drills and simulations allow decision makers to consider proactively how their organization may react to a disruptive event like a pandemic. Based on the failure point methodology, we can identify, define and assess various dependencies and assumptions. The methodology facilitates a nonbiased and critical analysis of response strategies to better validate and understand our plans and the interfaces with other entities (public/private). Health care professionals face a daunting challenge - how to effectively respond and manage hospital operations during a pandemic; and continue to provide care for nonpandemic related patients. Most hospital personnel do not have the skills required to develop and effectively implement a successful drill and exercise program. This topic is designed to help hospital personnel responsible for developing and implementing a drill/exercise program with the knowledge and tools required to create realistic simulations, document and track performance and improve existing plans, policies and procedures.