Chicago, Illinois
August 2021

Impact:

Within just three months of the launch of a newly redesigned online course on pediatric emergency response, nearly 25 percent of the 1,500 school nurses across Illinois signed up to participate. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the course was made available online thanks to a partnership between the Ann and Robert H Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago (Lurie Children’s), Illinois Department of Public Health, the Illinois’ EMS for Children (EMSC) program, and the Hospital Preparedness Program.

Since the 1990’s, Illinois has been offering this popular training, which includes modules on assessment and triage procedures, behavioral and mental health emergencies, management of the student prior to the arrival of emergency medical services (EMS), chronic conditions, and care for students with technology-dependent needs (e.g., use of wheelchairs or ventilators). When the COVID-19 pandemic prevented school nurses from taking the course in person, the course was transitioned to an online program to ensure continued access to the material, increase the number of attendees, and enhance equity.

The course is also available to nurses from five other states, with participants joining from Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, North Carolina, and Virginia​. The updated course ensures that those on the frontline of a pediatric emergency are best equipped to handle the situation. Through the use of HPP annual funding, the Illinois Department of Public Health was able to strengthen emergency preparedness and response by providing an accessible and comprehensive training course.

Background:

Beginning in the 1990s, Illinois was one of several states to offer an in-person emergency care course to school nurses practicing in the state. While some modules of the course, originally designed by the University of Connecticut, review general anatomy and related health emergencies, others focus on specific topics such as assessment and triage procedures, behavioral and mental health emergencies, management of the student prior to the arrival of emergency medical services (EMS), chronic conditions, and care for students with technology-dependent needs (e.g., use of wheelchairs or ventilators).

Before the pandemic, Illinois offered the course as an in-person training during the summer months to the state’s population of over 1,500 school nurses. When the COVID-19 pandemic prevented the course from taking place in person, the Ann and Robert H Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago (Lurie Children’s), in partnership with the Illinois Department of Public Health and Illinois’ EMS for Children (EMSC) program, used ASPR Hospital Preparedness Program (HPP) cooperative agreement funding to update the modules and convert them to a digital format as a virtual training.

Response Activities:

The team at Lurie Children’s used funding provided by the Illinois Department of Public Health’s Hospital Preparedness Program to form a committee of subject matter experts, which included school and emergency nurses who served as instructors and course coordinators for the in-person course. This assured that they were familiar with the course content and could identify needed revisions to material. This committee reviewed the current training to identify areas that required updating to reflect the latest clinical standards.

After the course material was updated, Lurie Children’s used HPP funding to contract a vendor to create virtual lectures with updated graphics and audio components. The new online course includes access to a 600+ page resource document to supplement the modules. Each module is about an hour in length, allowing participants to complete the course at their own rate and on demand.

Rockford, Illinois 
January 2022

Impact

In response to a surge in COVID-19 patients, Northwestern Illinois Preparedness and Response Coalition partnered with critical access hospitals and called on the National Disaster Medical System (NDMS) to manage patient surge.  ASPR deployed a team of NDMS responders to Mercyhealth Javon Bea Hospital in Rockford, Illinois to establish a regional hospital decompression unit. Working together, this team significantly alleviated the strain on the health care system in northwest region of Illinois and enabled the hospital to accept patients across the state and from neighboring states, such as Iowa and Wisconsin.

 

Background

In December of 2021, hospitals across the nation faced yet another surge of COVID-19 cases, caused by the Omicron variant. In addition to the lack of bed space caused by the surge, hospitals ran into additional challenges such as staffing shortages, causing a need for patient coordination support. 

The Northwest Illinois Preparedness and Response Coalition, an Illinois health care coalition (HCC) established through ASPR’s Hospital Preparedness Program (HPP), began coordinating with critical access hospitals to identify open bed space to alleviate patient surge and hospital strain. When it became clear that additional assistance was needed, the HCC coordinator worked with the Illinois Department of Public Health to request support. In response, HHS ASPR deployed an NDMS  team to Mercyhealth Javon Bea Hospital in Rockford, Illinois, to establish a regional hospital decompression unit.

“The nation’s health care system is severely strained due to high COVID-19 caseloads and further exacerbated by persistent staffing shortages across the healthcare sector. To help meet requests for federal support, we deployed teams to help relieve the pressure in an entire region of a state rather than supporting any one institution specifically” - Michael W. Smith Director, National Disaster Medical System

Response Activities

Together, the NDMS team and the Northwest Illinois Preparedness and Response Coalition coordinated to address the hospital surge and provide much needed relief to hospitals across the northwest region of the state. While the NDMS team focused on treating patients to alleviate the strain caused by staffing shortages, the Northwestern Illinois Preparedness and Response Coalition coordinated information sharing efforts by setting up a web-based dashboard that provided real-time information such as how many beds were occupied and where the occupants were from. In addition to the online dashboard, the HCC led daily meetings with representatives from regional hospitals, health departments, and emergency management agencies to support real-time information sharing and coordination efforts.

The Northwestern Illinois Preparedness and Response Coalition utilized employees from Mercyhealth Javon Bea Hospital to staff a Medical Operations Coordination Cell, which served as a patient transfer center. Finally, the HCC assisted with patient transportation by using its emergency medical services (EMS) relationships. The first patient transfer coordinated by the HCC involved an EMS agency who traveled four hours round trip, during a snowstorm, to pick up a patient and deliver them to the decompression unit. With federal support, this hospital was able to stand up a regional decompression unit and provide care for COVID-19 patients from the northwest region of Illinois, as well as Iowa and Wisconsin.