DomesticPreparedness met with CDR Melissa Sanders, RD, Branch Chief, Hospital Bioterrorism Preparedness, Health Resources and Services (HRSA). The HRSA head of the National Bioterrorism Hospital Preparedness Program (NBHPP) provides an illuminating program overview and details the support needed for equipment acquisition, pandemic planning, training, and NIMS compliance.
Audio Segment One Status Report on the National Bioterrorism Hospital Preparedness Program
NBHPP support to hospitals and other health care institutions for capacity building to accommodate large numbers of casualties. The need to improve surge capacity in local and regional health care (public and private) facilities.
Duration: 4 Minutes 38 Seconds
Audio Segment Two Specific NBHPP Priorities
Expanding the number of hospital beds and developing isolation capacity;entifying the additional health care personnel available for call-ups in public health emergencies; support for hospital-based pharmaceutical caches and CHEMPAK installation; support for hospital personal protective equipment (PPE) and both portable and fixed decontamination systems.
Duration: 7 Minutes 25 Seconds
Audio Segment Three HRSA and Pandemic Planning
The HRSA role in planning for pandemic flu. HRSA guidance on bed tracking.
Duration: 3 Minutes 38 Seconds
Audio Segment Four HRSA Support for Training
HRSA support for training, education, drills, and exercises, both for state departments of public health and hospital first receivers.
Duration: 3 Minutes 32 Seconds
Audio Segement Five HRSA Support for Improved Communications
HRSA support to jurisdictions for connectivity during public health emergencies and to expand and improve the coordination of disease reporting among hospitals and local and state health departments.
Duration: 3 Minutes 12 Seconds
Audio Segment Six National Incident Management System (NIMS) Compliance Requirements
HRSA funding to support NIMS compliance for hospitals and other healthcare facilities.
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Melissa Sanders
Commander Melissa Sanders is chief of the National Bioterrorism Hospital Preparedness Program, Healthcare Systems Bureau, Division of Healthcare Preparedness, of the Department of Health and Human Services' Health Resources and Services Administration. Her primary responsibility is the administration of cooperative agreements with state departments of health to improve the capacity of the hospitals and health care systems under them to deliver effective and coordinated care to victims of terrorism and other health emergencies. A 1986 graduate of Radford University, Sanders was commissioned into the U.S. Public Health Service in 1992.Prior to her present assignment she also participated in, among other federal healthcare preparedness projects, the response to Hurricane Katrina, the mass-casualty planning for hospitals for the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, and the food-service safety operations of the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, Ga.
