Hospital preparednessWisconsin hospitals ahead of the curve

In the 2009 H1N1 flu epidemic while public health officials across the United States were contending with shortages of basic supplies like ventilator masks, Wisconsin health authorities were able to smoothly weather the storm thanks to its stockpiles of protective clothing, emergency planning, and advanced training.

“We didn’t have a real severe problem with protective clothing, surgical masks, like other parts of the country did,” said David Seebart, the preparedness program’s project manager for Northeastern Wisconsin. “Everybody was on back order nationally. We were lucky enough to have a supply ahead of time to weather the event until after it was over.”

The stockpiles of protective clothing come as part of Wisconsin’s Hospital Emergency Preparedness program, which began following the 9/11 attacks as a way to coordinate a unified hospital response in the event of a major natural disaster or terrorist attack.

The program initially focused on biological weapons and other mass casualty attacks by ensuring that hospitals had adequate amounts of decontamination materials and other protective equipment.

“We were afraid when we took a look at each individual facility as a region and as a state. We thought, ‘What if we get burn victims or natural disaster victims or even natural disease outbreaks? Do we have the ventilator capacity?’” said Steve Pelch, director of safety and security at St. Vincent and St. Mary’s hospitals. “And the answer was, ‘No.’”

To guarantee that hospitals had the supplies they needed, the state began purchasing equipment as a coordinated unit so that in an emergency supplies can be shipped across the state.

“Now, we are going to get the same exact equipment. … If it breaks, our biomed team knows how to fix it. As soon as it arrives, we know how to use it,” Pelch said. “Not only did we increase our capacity with these ventilators, but now it’s shared equipment that can be mobilized and come to us very quickly.”

The program did not face any real tests until the H1N1 outbreak, in which its supplies were pushed to the limit. As some hospitals or regions began running out of masks or ventilators, authorities were able to assess which regions had surpluses that could be shipped to particularly hard hit areas.

Tom Ginter, the director of support services with Aurora BayCare Medical Center in Green Bay, said that the hospital was inundated with patients, but ultimately had extra masks that it was able to ship to other hospitals as part of a state-wide supply chain.

“We had our own stocks we were able to support from an in-system perspective,” he said. “We were able to sustain through that process. We were able to actually share some supplies with another facility to help them out.”

The speedy coordinated response was made possible thanks to stepped up efforts to maintain communication across the state. Members of the emergency program regularly meet each month, but during the H1N1 pandemic officials were holding daily conferences.

“Our biggest advancement in the past 10 years has been strictly in communication,” Pelch said.

To help officials communicate more quickly and efficiently, several technologies have been implemented like a software tool called WI Trac. With the program, implemented in 2008 across the state, hospitals across Wisconsin can instantly communicate with one another.

“I can put out an alert immediately, and hospitals will reply within minutes what they can send to us,” Pelch explained.

“The ability to communicate quickly and get all the information quickly has definitely increased,” said Scott Piontek, Bellin Health’s team leader for safety and security. “There are lots of communications and new technologies put in place now to communicate quickly with other hospital systems and throughout the state.”

The program is constantly looking at ways to improve and will continue to conduct trainings and drills to ensure that public health officials are prepared to respond to major disasters.