1. Winter storm — 52 percent
2. Power outages and other system failures — 48 percent
3. Tornado — 20 percent
4. Flood — 17 percent
5. Hurricane — 17 percent
6. Hazardous spill/hazardous material incident — 15 percent
7. Mass casualty incident — 13 percent
8. Fire — 12 percent
9. Emerging infectious diseases, excluding H1N1 — 12 percent
10. Bomb threat — 8 percent
11. Earthquake — 6 percent
12. Evacuation — 5 percent
13. Active shooter incident — 4 percent
14. Mass transit strike or disruption — 2 percent
Of the hospitals that responded to the survey, 13 percent had not experienced a threat or event in the past five years, the timeframe for which the question was posed.
The top barriers to emergency preparedness, according to the survey, included unfunded mandates for emergency preparedness and response (39 percent), time limitations (38 percent), competing resources/spending priorities (36 percent), governmental processes/compliance issues (22 percent) and staff training in response skills (21 percent).
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