The Charlotte, N.C.-based system released a white paper March 10 that outlines what contributed to their disaster recovery efforts following the storm.
“With our size and scale, we had the opportunity to do what we needed to and could do for the impacted communities, from getting additional staff to impacted hospitals, to deploying our mobile hospital, to flying patients out of affected areas and supplies in,” Jason Stopyra, MD, the system’s vice president of security who oversees the system’s emergency management team, said in the news release. “In a time of crisis, the power and resources of a large health care system offers those opportunities, and we are at the ready when those times of need come calling.”
Here are a few highlights:
1. The system deployed its Charlotte-based care delivery brand’s proprietary mobile hospital, Atrium Health MED-1, and utilized extensive air and ground transport services, including spontaneous helicopter supply missions, to deliver supplies to and provide care in affected areas.
2. Advocate used a real-time data dashboard that allowed for precise inventory management and distribution across its six-state footprint.
3. Its conservation measures included switching to oral hydration therapies and using smaller IV bags to reduce IV usage by 55%. This was vital after Baxter, the company that manufactures 60% of the nation’s supply, temporarily closed its Marion, N.C.-based plant due to severe flooding from the storm.
4. The supply management and conservation efforts resulted in no surgery cancellations due to IV shortages.
Read the full white paper here.
