1. VHASS Patient Tracking Overview
Regional Healthcare Coordination Center

2. About the Coalition… Central Virginia Healthcare Coalition
Healthcare Emergency Management Alliance
17 Acute Care Hospitals
4 Free-standing Emergency Departments
Long Term Care Facilities
Fire/EMS/Emergency Management Stakeholders
Exists to organize a regional healthcare preparedness program
Response
Recovery

3. Central Region

4. Other Regional Coalitions

5. Regional Healthcare Coordination Center (RHCC) Model Overview
All six healthcare coalitions operate a primary & backup Regional Healthcare Coordination Center (RHCC)
Written into the COV EOP
Statewide Hospital Emergency Operations Plan
Statewide Health & Medical Surge Plan (Annex J)
RHCC is a multi-agency emergency coordination center.
Responsible for emergency coordination of healthcare facility assets in the region.
Responsible for activation of the Regional Hospital Emergency Operations Plan.

6. RHCC Model Overview, contd.
RHCC facilitates emergency response, communication, and resource allocation for coalition members.
RHCC accomplishes this as the primary regional contact among:
Regional healthcare facilities (Hospitals and Long Term Care)
Other five RHCCs
State EOC through the ESF 8 (Public Health) annex.
Provide coalition stakeholders with:
Healthcare Intelligence
Incident coordination
Disaster resource management

7. Primary Central Virginia RHCC

8. Primary Central Virginia RHCC

9. The Importance of Family Reunification
Hurricane Katrina
Hurricane Rita
Boston Marathon Bombing
Virginia Tech Shootings
Large-Scale Transportation Accidents
Studies have shown that nearly 2/3rds of parents would disregard an evacuation order or shelter-in-place order and go directly to their child’s school or scene of an emergency.
When parents are familiar with the emergency reunification plans of their child’s temporary care providers, they are more likely to follow the orders of emergency officials, making everyone safer.

10. Goals of Patient Tracking
Provide continuity of information on the whereabouts of victims in a disaster.
Protect PHI

11. Scenarios for Use
MCI
Patient Evacuation
Planned Event

12. General Idea Patient gets a number as early as possible.
Patient information is populated into the tracking system as early as possible.
Searchable patient descriptors/number tracked throughout patient’s journey.

13. Where are we today? State patient tracking workgroup formed by VHHA.
Hospitals and stakeholders were surveyed about importance of patient tracking.
Committee investigated best practices.
HIPAA-compliant system implemented.
Long term evolving plan (data feeds, training, etc.)
CMS Regulatory Requirements

14. Don’t Lose Track Video…

15. Virginia’s Patient Tracking Program
Every hospital in the Commonwealth of Virginia uses the Virginia Healthcare Alerting & Status System (VHASS) to report critical information about the status of their facilities.
Information is reported to the RHCC and other emergency response entities across the state.
During Mass Casualty Incidents, hospitals enter basic patient information into VHASS.
At the request of the RHCC, the Call Center activates for the “Patient Locator” service.
Family members can call 2-1-1, and a trained operator searches the VHASS database for a patient “match”.
If a match is found, the caller is provided the hospital’s phone #.

16. Requesting Activation of 2-1-1
Your hospital may request that the RHCC activate the 211 Patient Locator service if:
1) Your facility has received patients from the scene of an MCI.
2) Your facility is receiving phone calls from individuals trying to locate a patient involved in the MCI.
Call the RHCC and request activation of the Patient Locator service:

17. VHASS Demo

18. Click Emergency Operations Page
Go to:
Enter a vaild username
Enter a valid password
Click Emergency Operations Page
Contact the Regional Healthcare Coordination Center (RHCC) for assistance:

19. Click “Patient Tracking”

20. disclaimer by pressing “OK”
Acknowledge the HIPAA
disclaimer by pressing “OK”
Add new patient to
tracking system (slide 5).
Transfer or check-in
existing patients
into your facility IF
you know their triage
tag number (slide 6).
List/Search for existing
patients at your facility
(slide 7)

21. Add/Track a New Patient Select Confidentiality
Status.
Select “Live” for an
actual event. “Test”
for a drill/exercise.
Enter in all available
PHI & De-identified
patient data. Press
“Save” when complete.

22. Questions? Andrew Slater, RHCC Manager 804-251-0429
RHCC 24/7 Activation: