Mass Notification Systems: A Useful Tool during Pandemic Response

Historical pandemics such as smallpox and avian flu have overwhelmed health care infrastructures and spread quickly through populations, causing serious illness and death for thousands of people. Because the potential impact of a pandemic is so great, health facilities and health organizations must be ready to quickly respond to such an event in order to mitigate the damage.

Health care facilities now are using network-centric emergency mass notification to transform their existing Internet protocol (IP) networks and connected devices into highly capable emergency alerting systems. Alerts can be triggered using a Web browser on any network-connected PC (subject to authentication and granted permissions). Once activated, alerts are disseminated across the network in the form of intrusive audio/visual messages to desktop computers, as well as mobile devices such as phones, pagers, BlackBerry devices and personal digital assistants (PDAs).

Since many traditional alerting channels (sirens, telephones, public address systems, etc.) now have IP interfaces, network-centric notification systems can trigger alerts to those channels, extending and unifying these systems under a single alert management platform.

10 BENEFITS

The advantages of a network-based emergency mass notification system for health facilities are numerous, and include:

• Unified notification: Integrates with many IP-based and legacy notification systems to provide easy and effective emergency notification from a single Web-based console.

• Rapid and pervasive reach: Distributes emergency alerts to hundreds of thousands of people through network-connected devices in minutes.

• Web-based system access: Operators can send alerts from anywhere they have a network connection (given authentication and authorization).

• Richer message delivery: Delivers detailed and tailored communications based on the threat or scenario.

• Multi-use/full-spectrum threat response: Has greater capability to respond to any pandemic or scenario requiring rapid and pervasive mass notification.

• Confirmed alert receipt and acknowledgment tracking: Tracks delivery and acknowledges every alert to ensure people have received the information.

• Personnel accountability: Receives rapid and reliable feedback on status of personnel.

• Regulatory compliance: IP-based notification complies with federal and Department of Defense (DoD) emergency mass notification guidelines.

• Cost savings: By leveraging the existing IP network, a health organization realizes substantial cost savings.

• Quick installation: By leveraging the existing network, installation and infrastructure integration can be completed within hours or very few days.

The network-centric model holds other significant benefits for health emergency managers. A network-centric alerting system gives facility emergency managers the ability to obtain and disseminate critical situational details. Alerts sent through the IP network to computer desktops can include detail unavailable through audio alerts made through a loud speaker, accelerating response times and getting the appropriate personnel to respond to each situation. Alerts can be tailored to target specific groups based on location, role and organizational hierarchy. For example, medical personnel can be directed to the emergency rooms, while non-essential building occupants are advised to stay out of infected areas of the facility. Such on-the-scene information can be invaluable to emergency managers and greatly increase the effectiveness of the response.

Another critical capability of a network-centric mass alerting system is a feedback capability that can communicate the status of alert recipients. When an alert is sent, the system will require a response from recipients to determine their status (available, sick, etc.), locations and their abilities to act. This provides facility emergency managers with a reliable picture of personnel accountability and what resources are available to deploy. This amount of detailed information represents a tremendous asset in helping emergency managers make the best possible operational decisions during an emergency and will help ensure a safe outcome for all personnel.

With third-generation mass notification systems, emergency managers can obtain reliable, detailed status of all impacted personnel in minutes during an emergency, thereby greatly enhancing their response to the pandemic or threat.