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LEADERS can save
lives
During
an emergency, every second can mean the difference between
life and death. Many times, however, an ambulance arrives
at a hospital only to find the emergency room full —
meaning those precious moments are lost as the ambulance
and patient must be redirected to another hospital.
But
now 18 hospitals in Northern Virginia have formed a
coalition to help solve this problem. The hospitals
have adopted a Web-based software system that allows
them to improve their ability to track and monitor critical
care availability and to direct ambulances en route.
Called LEADERS — for Lightweight Epidemiology Advanced
Detection and Emergency Response System — the system
gives dispatchers an instant and comprehensive view
of how many beds and other assets are available at any
moment.
The
LEADERS program also includes Web-based tracking that’s
used as a communication tool between the emergency room,
the emergency medical system dispatchers and the emergency
medical technicians that lets each division know department
and bed status in real-time. “Dispatchers can do
a query that is in real-time and have current, up-to-date
information,” says Steve Cooperman, director of
homeland security solutions for Oracle, which developed
the software. Also, using the program decreases the
need for re-routing ambulances, says Dan Hanfling, director
of emergency preparedness and disaster medicine for
INOVA Health System.
—
Kenisha Wiggs
Return
to Virginia Business - January 2003
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