Planning Resources by Setting: Emergency Responders and 9-1-1

The following resources are intended to assist communities who work in 9-1-1 and Emergency Medical Services with considering how to use call centers and other partners to relieve the surge on those systems during an emergency.

Healthcare Preparedness and Response Team Tools

• The Framework for Expanding EMS System Capacity During Medical Surge
  The Framework for Expanding EMS System Capacity During Medical Surge is a tool for community planners to help explore the role of EMS in medical surge planning and to examine the need to supplement existing guidance on integrating EMS into community preparedness plans. The EMS Framework addresses the partnerships, resources, and planning needed for expanding EMS system capacity during an emergency resulting in medical surge.
• Coordinating Call Centers for Responding to Pandemic Influenza and Other Public Health Emergencies: A Workbook for State and Local Planners (4.4 MB/242 pages)
  This CDC workbook provides a six-step process of developing a coordinated call center system. It includes worksheets to fill out through each step of the development process.
• Managing Calls and Call Centers during a Large-Scale Influenza Outbreak: Implementation Tool
  This tool was developed by CDC during H1N1 to help community planners identify steps to divert unnecessary calls away from the community 9-1-1 system and non-critically ill patients away from the healthcare system to reserve both for actual emergency situations. This implementation tool provides a step-by-step approach by focusing on alternative call center resources.
• Interim Guidance for Emergency Medical Services (EMS) Systems and 9-1-1 Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) for Management of Patients Under Investigation (PUIs) for Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) in the United States
  This guidance is intended for emergency medical services (EMS) providers and first responders who will be handling inquiries and responding to patients under investigation (PUIs) for Ebola.
• Identify, Isolate, Inform: Emergency Medical Services (EMS) Systems and 9-1-1 Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) for Management of Patients Who Present with Possible Ebola Virus Disease (Ebola) in the United States
  This algorithm operationalizes the content of the “Interim Guidance for Emergency Medical Services (EMS) Systems and 9-1-1 Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) for Management of Patients Under Investigation (PUIs) for Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) in the United States”.
• Guidance for Developing a Plan for Interfacility Transport of Persons Under Investigation or Confirmed Patients with Ebola Virus Disease in the United States
  This document provides guidance for developing plans for interfacility (including intrastate or interstate) transport of PUIs or patients with confirmed Ebola. This can be used by ground and air medical transport providers, as well as managers of EMS agencies, EMS medical directors, local and state EMS systems, local and state health departments, healthcare facilities, and others involved in the State EMS officials and regional and state EMS planners. Three separate standard operating procedures (SOPs) related to this guidance can be used as templates or guides for the development of local/state/jurisdiction level SOPs. They include
  1. Example: Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for Patient Handoff between a Healthcare Facility and a Transporting Ambulance
  2. Example: Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for Decontamination of an Ambulance that has Transported a Person under Investigation or Patient with Confirmed Ebola
  3. Example: Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) for Air-to-Ground (Air-Ground) Patient Handoff

Other Tools

• Emergency Medical Services & Medical Surge: Essential Legal Issues
  The webinar and report features research and analysis of legal issues impacting EMS providers and others during medical surge. Topics include emergency, disaster, or public health emergency authorities; use of protocols to authorize specific actions among EMS providers; licensing reciprocity; modifying scopes of practice; EMTALA; legal accountability; liability protections; and reimbursement to EMS providers for patient transport to alternate sites.
  • Webinar
  • Report
• Adapting Community Call Centers for Crisis Support: A Model for Home-Based Care and Monitoring
  This AHRQ report describes a model to enable community health call centers to support home-management and shelter-in-place approaches in mass casualty or public health emergency events. Community call centers include poison control centers, nurse advice lines, and other hotlines.