New Emergency Operations
Center
Puts Many Agencies
Under One Roof
by Pamela Mooman
San Antonio’s new state-of-theart
Emergency Operations
Center will increase response
time and efficiency during any sort of
emergency situation by combining
local, regional, state, and federal
resources under one roof.
“This $25 million, 36-thousandsquare
feet EOC will present a unified
front in emergency management and
preparedness by combining both City
and County OEM Staff,” says James
Mendoza, Assistant Emergency
Management Coordinator for the City
of San Antonio. “San Antonio faces
significant threats of all kinds that
require a high level of decision-making,
resource allocation and resource
management. This facility will bring all
emergency management disciplines
together so that lives can be saved and
the community can recover to a normal
standard of living following a
large-scale disaster.
“San Antonio is fortunate to have a
highly trained and skilled first
response community. The development
of this new facility is a message
that San Antonio will be prepared to
respond to any and all disasters that
may affect our residents.”
The center, dedicated on December
3, 2007, includes the Regional Medical
Operations Center, the hub for the
city’s medical response teams. The
RMOC is a body of agencies that coordinate
hospital activities, says Roger
Pollok, Emergency Coordinator for the
Health Department.
“From the very beginning, all emergency
situations are addressed by both
city and county officials, making
responses much more efficient,” he
says. “No agency is left out. The new
EOC allows all of these resources to be
coordinated. Emergency responses
happen so much faster because everyone’s
in the same room. Multiple agencies
can coordinate in one room, with
the right players, and you can talk it
out right there.”
Local physicians play a vital role in
emergency response efforts. The Bexar
County Medical Society has a seat on
the RMOC to ensure that when physicians
are needed during an emergency
event, the call for physician volunteers
goes out quickly and efficiently. The
BCMS’ Emergency Preparedness
Committee, chaired by Bernard Swift,
DO, is charged with helping BCMS to
be ready to respond at a moment’s
notice when disaster strikes.
Dr. Swift, who owns nine Texas
MedClinics in San Antonio and one
in New Braunfels, says his concern
with coordinating the clinics’ role
with the overall community plan in
the event of an emergency was the
fountainhead for his involvement
with the committee.
Despite busy lives and practices,
he urges other physicians to educate
themselves about emergency preparedness,
because due to its very
nature, an emergency cannot be
prepared or planned for once it
has begun.
“Raising physician awareness is
one of the stated goals of the
Emergency Preparedness
Committee,” Dr. Swift says. “We try
to attract physicians who are interested
in emergency preparedness.”
Over the past year, Dr. Swift says
the committee has focused on coordinating
with various Bexar County
agencies in the event of a mass coastal evacuation. Good decisions were
made during the events of Rita and Katrina, Dr. Swift says, but with more
advance preparation, San Antonio’s
response can be even more efficient.
Dr. Swift and the Emergency Preparedness
Committee are trying to reach
out to all physicians, and especially to
primary care physicians, not yet involved
in emergency preparedness.
“We want them to consider what
their role may be in various disaster
scenarios,” he says. “Physicians should
consider whether or not they should
close their offices or keep them open
in the event of a disaster. They need to
think about what personal protection
equipment they may need, and how
they may need to protect their facility.
“We want to help them take steps to
prepare for an emergency. It takes forethought
and specific plans to prepare
for an emergency. The Emergency
Preparedness Committee can help
physicians do that.”
The San Antonio Metropolitan
Health District and the Texas
Department on State Health Services
(DSHS) formed the Medical Volunteer
Coordinating Committee (MVCC), a
cutting-edge committee divided into
medical disciplines. This committee,
Mr. Pollok says, is specifically tasked to
provide medical resources during an
event based upon the type of medical
specialties needed. The MVCC, formed in April 2007 initially as a response to hurricane events, is
a national model, Mr. Pollok says.
“The concept seems to have taken a foothold, and it
began right here in San Antonio,” he says.
The concept for a unified Emergency Operations
Center surfaced in 2002, after the terrorist attacks on
September 11, 2001, Mr. Pollok says. Officials with the
bioterrorism lab in downtown San Antonio began talks
with military officials at the then-Brooks Air Force Base,
now Brooks City-Base.
“It quickly became a popular idea with the Brooks
Development Authority,” Mr. Pollok says. “Everyone
involved wanted a new technological center in San
Antonio that could provide technological resources that
everybody needed and which could utilize the security that
Brooks could offer.”
Area universities also play a role in the MVCC, providing
unlicensed assistants, such as nursing and medical students,
to help licensed health care professionals.
Reaching Physician Volunteers
One of the most daunting issues to address when trying
to mobilize a large number of emergency medical volunteers
is maintaining an up-to-date database.
“One of the challenges of public health is that it’s very
labor-intensive to have a database,” Mr. Pollok says. “It is
very hard to maintain updated information. The best
resource for this information is the people who do this
everyday.” And that is where the MVCC comes in — to
efficiently match licensed medical professionals with people
who need that expertise. The agencies that are part of
the MVCC, such as the BCMS, own and maintain their
own databases and can fully utilize their expertise in
reaching medical volunteers quickly.
For those physicians who are not members of the
BCMS, but who still wish to volunteer, they can contact
the BCMS, and if their specific discipline is needed in the
event of an emergency, they will be notified.
During the Hurricane Dean threat, for example, medical
professionals, from physicians to registered nurses
and others, could have dialed a phone number that was
ready to be released to scroll across local televisions.
Callers would then have been forwarded to the appropriate
organization to dispense their services where they
were needed most.
“That’s how the outside people get in,” Mr. Pollok says.
Maintaining a Database
The Emergency Systems for Advance Registration of
Volunteer Health Professionals, or ESAR-VHP, is a
nationwide network of state-owned and operated database
systems that helps emergency officials maintain an
up-to-date database for the purpose of contacting
licensed medical practitioners as quickly as possible during
an emergency situation.
Each state has specific customizations of ESAR-VHP, and
in Texas, starting this month, licensed professionals will be
added to the database when they apply for license renewal.
They will receive a questionnaire asking them if they want
to volunteer for local, regional, and even national disasters,
Mr. Pollok says.
Another Texas custom feature of ESAR-VHP is the new
Medical Reserve Corps, a sub-category under ESAR-VHP. It
is through this new organization that non-licensed individuals
can be recruited, he adds. Volunteers may include
nursing students, truck drivers to help move supplies, computer
technicians, and administrative assistants — anyone
who can offer services to keep the control centers running
during an emergency. These volunteers will receive “just in
time” training.
“We would tell them what they need to do, make sure
they’re clear about their duties, then turn them loose to do
their tasks,” Mr. Pollok says.
This new ESAR-VHP database system is supported locally
by the Texas Department of State Health Services Region
8, San Antonio Metro Health, and the Southwest Texas
Regional Advisory Council on Trauma (STRAC).
“The more support you have from various agencies, the
faster and easier you can get the word out, and the more
funding you can get,” Mr. Pollok says. “The program will
accelerate with combined efforts and make it possible to
coordinate specialized areas of expertise.”
The ARCC Umbrella
Both the RMOC and the Medical Volunteer Coordinating
Center (MVCC) are under the umbrella of the Alamo
Regional Command Center (ARCC), a concept developed
by District Chief Nim Kidd, City Emergency Management
Coordinator.
The ARCC is housed in the Emergency Operations
Center. The concept came about after previous disaster
situations, when so many agencies were involved that
they could not be housed together, and temporary facilities
had to be set up at short notice. Previously, the
ARCC had been housed in Building 1537 at the Kelly
Port Authority. Now, with the new Emergency
Operations Center, the ARCC will have a permanent
home and room enough for local, county, state, and federal
agencies such as the Department of Health and
Human Services and the Centers for Disease Control
that, as Mr. Pollok says, may “lean forward into the local
command center.”
“This new arrangement will streamline communication
between local, regional, state, and federal officials,”
he says, “because there is now a facility large enough to
house everyone.
“Because of the ARCC concept, local agencies can
request services from regional or federal agencies. This
makes it possible to provide services that might not otherwise
be accessible on a strictly local level.”
For more information about volunteer possibilities and
emergency preparedness, physicians who are BCMS members
may contact Melody Newsom at the BCMS Administrative
Office at 301-4391 or melody.newsom@bcms.org.
Pamela Mooman is the editor of San Antonio Medicine.
