OSHA News

New Hospital First Receiver Training Package Meets JCAHO, OSHA Requirements

(April 30, 2007)--Emergency Film Group, has produced Hospital First Receiver, a training package that prepares healthcare workers to handle a rapid influx of contaminated patients from a terrorist attack or other mass casualty incident. The series follows the guidelines of OSHA's Best Practices for Hospital-Based First Receivers and JCAHO's accreditation standards for decontamination and emergency planning.

The package consists of 4 DVDs and an Instructor Guide and Student Workbook. It provides at least eight hours of training in the competencies required by OSHA for certification at the Operations Level. President Gordon Massingham of Emergency Film Group, who directs the series, has been involved in Hazwoper training for over two decades. "An incident involving mass casualties from a hazardous materials or WMD event would place healthcare facilities and staff at risk of contamination. Hospital staff assigned to carry out decontamination require Operations Level training, yet until now most Operations Level training has been aimed at fire fighters. Our customers have been eager to have this type of training for their healthcare facilities," says Massingham.

The series explains and portrays the use of ICS within a healthcare environment that is consistent with the most recent revision of the Hospital Incident Command System (HICS -- formerly HEICS). It will help healthcare facilities integrate with the National Incident Management System (NIMS). Hospitals and other medical facilities that become NIMS compliant are better able to work with law enforcement, fire, and other emergency agencies during times of crisis.

The four modules in Hospital First Receiver are "Recognizing Contaminated Patients," "Hospital Incident Command System," "Self Protection," and "Patient Decontamination." Although it is sold as a series for Operations Level certification, the individual programs may also be purchased separately. "For example," explains Massingham, "a hospital that purchases "Recognizing Contaminated Patient would be able to show this program to every employee for Awareness Level training. Or they may choose to purchase the HICS program to update their incident management plans."

The technical committee for this series includes many well-known authorities in hospital emergency response, including Phil Currance, the Deputy Commander of the Central U.S. National Medical Response Team for WMD, US Public Health Service; Janet Rowe-Eikenberry, Coordinator of Environment, Health and Safety Services at the University of Tennessee Medical Center; Zachary Goldfarb, who spent 25 years with the City of New York Fire Department's (FDNY) Emergency Medical Service Command where he headed the Special Operations Division; Paul Penn, founder of Hazmat for Healthcare and formerly the Manager of Environmental Health & Safety at the Kaiser Permanente Sacramento Medical Center; and Dr. Paul Rega, who founded the OH-1 DMAT (Ohio) and established it with the National Disaster Medical System.

The series was filmed on location with the University of Tennessee Medical Center and the Knoxville (TN) Fire and Police Departments.

Emergency Film Group uses leading professionals in emergency response and film production to create authoritative and accurate training programs for hospitals and EMS, fire departments, hazmat teams, emergency management, police, the military and other emergency responders. Winner of more than 150 awards in national and international competitions, the company provides training on such timely topics as incident management, terrorism response, homeland security, hazardous materials, protective clothing, and air monitoring for its more than 12,000 customers.

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