141st APHA Annual Meeting

In This section

287073
Community healthcare delivery post-Hurricane Sandy: Lessons from a mobile medical unit

Monday, November 4, 2013

Cynthia Lien, MD , Deparment of Medicine, North Shore LIJ Health System, New Hyde Park, NY
John Raimo, MD , Internal Medicine, Hofstra North Shore-LIJ Health System, Manhasset, NY
Sameer Khanijo, MD , Internal Medicine, Hofstra North Shore-LIJ Health System, Manhasset, NY
Jessica Abramowitz, MD , Internal Medicine, Hofstra North Shore-LIJ Health System, Manhasset, NY
Athena Kritharis, MD , Internal Medicine, Hofstra North Shore-LIJ Health System, Manhasset, NY
Christopher Mason, DO , Internal Medicine, Hofstra North Shore-LIJ Health System, Manhasset, NY
Maria Carney, MD , Community Based Geriatrics, Hofstra North Shore-LIJ Health System, Manhasset, NY
Charles Jarmon, MPH, MBA, EMT-P , North Shore LIJ Health System, North Shore - LIJ Health System, Manhasset, NY
In the wake of Hurricane Sandy, a deadly Atlantic tropical cyclone that swept across the U.S. East Coast in October of 2012, North Shore – LIJ (NSLIJ) Health System deployed a mobile health unit to New York's most significantly damaged areas including Queens County and Long Island. Leadership personnel from the NSLIJ Health System, one of the nation's largest health systems consisting of 16 hospitals, 300 ambulatory facilities and over 40,000 employees coordinated the medical relief effort. The team's objective was to provide immediate and short-term healthcare services to communities impacted by Hurricane Sandy using the mobile health unit. The project consisted of three phases: 1) a widespread community needs assessment to effectively allocate the health system's resources, 2) health professional outreach and 3) pre-deployment and on-going resource needs assessments to optimize the unit's functionality. Data from the mobile unit records was collected on 638 patients aged 3 months to 91 years evaluated over a 35-day deployment period from November 16th through January 10th, 2012. Vaccination requests were the most commonly encountered issue, and the most common chief complaint was upper respiratory illness. Medication and supply needs, community needs, operational expenses and staffing costs for deployment were compiled on an on-going basis. Through the mobile health unit effort the NSLIJ health system identified key features contributing to the success of the mission as well as obstacles, limitations and future challenges of mobile medical care. Lessons from the mission will contribute to improvements in future community healthcare delivery efforts.

Learning Areas:
Administration, management, leadership
Chronic disease management and prevention
Clinical medicine applied in public health
Program planning
Provision of health care to the public

Learning Objectives:
Identify key resources, methods and strategies to facilitate and optimize the initiation, organization, implementation and maintenance of a mobile health unit in a community-based health system to provide immediate and short-term healthcare to vulnerable populations affected by natural disaster. Describe successful strategies as well as limitations, obstacles and future challenges in implementing a mobile health unit after natural disaster.

Keywords: Community Health Assessment, Disasters

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I am one of six chief medical residents in a large medicine residency program. I and my colleagues were involved in providing direct medical care to patients on the mobile health unit during Hurricane Sandy. I reviewed and analyzed the data compiled from the mobile unit, and identified the facilitators and obstacles in the recovery effort by communicating with key personnel involved in development of the mobile health unit effort.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.