The 25th annual Vermont Healthcare and EMS Preparedness conference assesses a multitude of topics ranging from the response to Superstorm Sandy to volunteer recruitment. But this year, Ebola is taking center stage.
The four-day conference brings hundreds of health professionals and emergency responders to Killington to discuss best practices on a range of emergency practices. The sessions begin as the nation experiences heightened concerns over the spread of Ebola virus in the U.S. The conference agenda has been adjusted to reflect that awareness. Vermont Health Department Emergency Preparedness and Emergency Medical Services Director Chris Bell says he and other presenters will tailor their talks to the Ebola issue. “The nature and scope of the outbreak has continued to grow and there’s a lot attention from our providers to it. We had already scheduled a couple different infection control lectures and the speakers have graciously agreed to actually tailor their talks to specifically discuss Ebola prevention and care of patients with Ebola instead of the topics that they were going to present.”
Concurrent with the conference, Congress is reviewing the CDC’s response to the spread of Ebola. During a hearing of the House Energy and Commerce Oversight Subcommittee, Vermont representative Peter Welch quizzed Dr. Thomas R. Frieden, Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “Is it feasible that all of our hospitals are going to be in a position to provide state-of-the-art treatment or does it, as a practical matter, make sense for hospitals to contact you when they have a potential infection, for you to come, and then for us to have centers to which that individual who is infected can be treated?”
Frieden responded: “Every hospital needs to be able to think it may be Ebola, diagnose it, to call us and then we will send a team to determine what is best for that hospital and that patient.”
Welch turned to the committee chair to deride proposed budget cuts to the health organizations. “We may want to have a hearing at some point about what is the funding requirements to make certain that the infrastructure this country needs be in place before something happens and they have everything that they need.”
While Congress grilled the CDC, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced a readiness strategy to deal with any potential outbreak of the virus in the Empire State. “We are trying to get the entire system up to speed. We have over 200 hospitals in the state. All 200 are being prepared so they could identify a case of Ebola if it should walk in the door. But we’re going to have eight identified hospitals that have intensive training and protocols. The upstate airports, upstate train stations, etc., will be receiving training. This is very much a group effort and a coordinative effort. We’ve been working very closely with the federal government and the CDC.
The Health Department will conduct unannounced drills and issue updated protocols and training procedures for medical, transit and other public facilities.
Officials at the CVPH Medical Center in Plattsburgh are reviewing the governor’s plan and what it means for the regional hospital. Chief Quality and Information Officer Dr. Wouter Rietsema, an infectious disease specialist, notes that the medical center is part of the Fletcher Allen hospital network. They are seeking pre-approval to transfer any potential Ebola patient to the main facility in Burlington, Vt. Reitsema adds that what they need is equipment and expertise to train. “The training procedure depends on what the infectious agent is. And we, like all hospitals in the U.S. I would guess, thought we had a plan. The events of the last week and the events of Dallas have made it clear that the guidance that we were following on personal protective gear was probably insufficient. You’ve seen the CDC change their guidance. So everybody is scrambling to meet a higher level of protection. That involves getting the proper equipment, making sure that it can work and then training. What we thought we were going to do, which we are trained to, is obviously not sufficient for a late stage Ebola case.”
The Vermont Health Department’s Chris Bell is confident that the region and the nation have the ability to control the spread of Ebola. “We at the state Health Department work with all of our hospitals in Vermont and neighboring states to prepare in case of an Ebola patient or any kind of unknown novel virus or infection that happens. The way that Ebola is spread and the infrastructure that’s present in Africa where this horrible outbreak is currently occurring is very different than that of the United States and of New England. The prevention of transmission of Ebola in health care settings in the United States is well understood and it is the basic of infection control practice. It will be controlled in health care facilities in the U.S. Everybody understands how to do so.”
The Vermont Healthcare and EMS Preparedness conference runs through Sunday.
