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Making Space to Save Lives: A Critical Role for the Hospitalist During Mass Casualty Incidents

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 August 2022

Michael A. DeLuca Open the ORCID record for Michael A. DeLuca [Opens in a new window] ,
Jeffrey L. Greenwald ,
Philip B. Manners ,
Steven Knuesel  and
Paul D. Biddinger
Michael A. DeLuca*
Affiliation:
Harvard Affiliated Emergency Medicine Residency Program, Boston, Massachusetts, USA Department of Emergency Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts, USA Department of Emergency Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Jeffrey L. Greenwald
Affiliation:
Core Educator Faculty, Department of Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Philip B. Manners
Affiliation:
Hospital Medicine Unit, Department of Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts, USA Disaster Medicine Fellowship, Department of Emergency Medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Steven Knuesel
Affiliation:
Core Educator Faculty, Department of Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts, USA Hospital Medicine Unit, Department of Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Paul D. Biddinger
Affiliation:
Department of Emergency Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts, USA Center for Disaster Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
*
Corresponding author: Michael A DeLuca, Email: michael.deluca@mgh.harvard.edu.
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Abstract

Objective:

An effective hospital response to mass casualty incidents (MCIs) requires rapid mobilization of personnel capable of caring for critically ill trauma patients and availability of resuscitation resources.

Methods:

Hospitals facing an MCI wrestle with the challenge of immediately adjusting their overextended clinical operations to resuscitate a large number of rapidly arriving patients without compromising the care of existing patients.

Results:

Hospitalists are well positioned to add significant value by off-loading the emergency department (ED) given their broad clinical expertise. We describe our institution’s protocol to generate immediate and sustained surge capacity by integrating our hospitalist service into MCI response.

Conclusions:

Our protocol details the safe and rapid transfer of care of existing ED patients to hospitalist teams to make ED staff and space available to care for incoming MCI patients.

Keywords

surge capacitymass casualty incidentdisaster medicinehospital medicinehospitalistemergency preparedness
Type
Brief Report
Information
Disaster Medicine and Public Health Preparedness , Volume 17 , 2023 , e213
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Society for Disaster Medicine and Public Health, Inc.

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