Page - 141 - in Applied Interdisciplinary Theory in Health Informatics - Knowledge Base for Practitioners
Image of the Page - 141 -
Text of the Page - 141 -
Figure 4. The four resilience potentials forming the RAG [27].
In terms of the thunderstorm asthma case, and guided by the RAG, we can
examine what happened retrospectively in order to learn and develop information
systems to improve the response of emergency services to future large scale unexpected
events affecting population health. One of the difficulties faced by emergency services
was that, at the time people were experiencing acute respiratory symptoms, information
on the cause and extent of the problem was limited. Using the RAG framework, we can
look at the successes and failures of information systems when challenged by the
thunderstorm asthma event, as follows:
Actual: the ability to respond to the thunderstorm asthma event. Despite the rapid
onset of events, the Emergency Services Telecommunications Authority (ESTA),
Ambulance Victoria (AV) and Victorian hospitals responded quickly and increased the
scale of their respective operations. The State Health Emergency Response Plan
(SHERP) was not activated at an appropriate level, however, so processes to aggregate
and share data were not available. In addition, neither ESTA nor AV formally activated
their emergency escalation plans. The key decision-maker was the State Health and
Medical Commander (DHHS). DHHS communicated with hospitals through mobile
text messages, phone calls and emails to individuals such as hospital Chief Executive
Officers; this resulted in inefficiency, and inconsistency of information provided to
hospitals. In response, some hospitals contacted each other directly to obtain
information.
Critical: the ability to monitor as thunderstorm asthma developed. When
information is limited, it is vital to identify triggers for action. During the thunderstorm
asthma event, there was a surge in demand for telecommunications, ambulance and
hospital services. Monitoring of usage by the Emergency Services Telecommunications
Authority (ESTA; see Figure 5), Ambulance Victoria (AV) and Victorian hospitals for
future unexpected events may allow for a rapid surge in demand to act as a trigger to
activate emergency response plans.
R.Clay-WilliamsandJ.Braithwaite /ResilientHealthCare 141
back to the
book Applied Interdisciplinary Theory in Health Informatics - Knowledge Base for Practitioners"
Applied Interdisciplinary Theory in Health Informatics
Knowledge Base for Practitioners
- Title
- Applied Interdisciplinary Theory in Health Informatics
- Subtitle
- Knowledge Base for Practitioners
- Authors
- Philip Scott
- Nicolette de Keizer
- Andrew Georgiou
- Publisher
- IOS Press BV
- Location
- Amsterdam
- Date
- 2019
- Language
- English
- License
- CC BY-NC 4.0
- ISBN
- 978-1-61499-991-1
- Size
- 16.0 x 24.0 cm
- Pages
- 242
- Category
- Informatik