item concerns for high-risk scenarios. You should determine the
potential risks that are most likely to occur at your center and in
your community, and prioritize your efforts to prepare for those
emergency events. For example, a surgery center in Miami might
focus on hurricane preparedness, while a hospital in Denver might
zero in on surviving a catastrophic blizzard.
Kaiser Permanente's Hazard Vulnerability Analysis tool
(osmag.net/3uETVx), one of the many online resources available to
help guide this exercise, asks you to rate the probability of 60 events
occurring at your facility. You plug in ratings of the severity of each
event's impact on human life, property damage and interruption of
your everyday services, as well as your staff and facility's level of
preparedness to handle the emergencies. The tool will then automat-
ically generate a percentage risk score for each potential event; the
higher the score, the higher the priority you should place on prepar-
ing for that particular scenario.
Document response protocols. Meet with staff to discuss how
you'll respond operationally to the high-priority emergency situa-
tions you identified. Document your response protocols: who'll be
responsible for coordinating the response, who'll handle internal com-
munications, who'll take care of patients in all areas of the facility —
including those who are in the middle of surgery — and who'll ensure
emergency supplies are available and at the ready.
It's also important to dig a little deeper. For example, during a
power outage, how much power can your facility's generator pro-
vide? What immediate services must the generator power? How
long can those services be sustained? How will patients be evacu-
ated and who will coordinate those efforts? CMS wants to see that
you've considered and documented those types of factors in your
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