Hospital experiences sudden, complete and lengthy power outage

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Until around 4 PM, Monday had been a perfectly normal workday. No one expected that an electrical fire at 4:15 would put both the main and backup generators out of service, leaving half of our 10-story hospital without power. Black, rancid smoke billowed up from the basement boiler room, spreading down the second-floor hallway to the east wing and the pharmacy.

The fire knocked out all lighting, phones, pagers, and even otherwise dependable emergency electrical circuits. Pharmacy personnel rushed to locate flashlights so that they could exit the building. Equipment we had grown to depend on had suddenly stopped functioning. But even then we did not anticipate that operations would not be back to normal for two more weeks.(note two weeks with outside help)

--snip--

Following the fire, our engineering department had obtained a mobile electrical generator that was put to use providing limited power to the facility's east wing. On Tuesday morning, we tapped into this emergency source with extension cords and restored power to two refrigerators, our laminar flow hood, and a coffee maker.

--snip--

On Friday, the hospital was still partially shut down; there was no elevator services... --snip-- Our emergency department, operating room, east wing nursing units, and radiology, laboratory, and dietary departments remained out of service.

--snip--

Two weeks after the fire, after considerable work by our engineering department and outside contractors, full electrical service was restored.

--snip--

We also learned that even carefully written disaster plans often do not spell out all the details.....One question that remains unswered (and somewhat disturbing) is, what would our response have been if the fire had happened at another time of day, perhaps during the weekend, or when weather would have had a greater impact?

From Hospital Pharmacy 1999;34(1):13-14

This happened in Roanoke, VA, though it does not mention when. The answer to the last question (though the disaster won't be fire) may be discovered 1/1/2000. Unfortunately generators, outside contractors and another hospital to transger patients to probably won't be as available. Scary!

-- Bill S. (Bill_S3@juno.com), February 06, 1999

Answers

Sorry, that should read ...transfer patients to probably won't be available.

-- Bill S. (Bill_S3@juno.com), February 06, 1999.

Hospitals are toast for Y2K at this point. Maybe some will GI and use every remaining second to work on remediation and contingency plans. None of the ones we work in have seriously changed any antiquated plans or even clued their employees in on their (non)progress.

There are binders full of disaster plans. Every so often when JCAHO is about to come thru on survey, everybody is told in a memo where the books are and encouraged to read them. Never met anybody who had actually opened the cover. In our hospital, we asked for a secretarial manual because so many of the workers at all levels couldn't function with the phones/paperwork/procedures most of the time. The ed dept. finally unearthed a 14-yr old book that nobody had seen for over a decade. Hadn't been updated. Book was explaining using 3-copy carbons! Hhhmmm.

Have written a lot about our hospital experiences on other threads.
Needless to say, we're back to home care :) :) :) :)

Ashton & Leska in Cascadia, expecting many patients in the beginning of 2000 until ppl realize it's long-term care-facility shut-downs and jobs & money dry up

xxxxxxx xxxxxxx xxxxxxx xxx

-- Leska (allaha@earthlink.net), February 06, 1999.


Leska,

Having worked in Long Term Care pharmacy business for 6 years, my feeling is that they aren't not much ahead of hospitals if at all. It's too bad as some of these elderly have so much to contribute mentally, but physically they can't, and their kids can't take care of them so they're put out to pasture. It will be interesting to see what HCFA says about facilities compliance once they GI (if they do). It's too bad that JCAHO surveys aren't done unannounced. I doubt many would pass since they don't have time to remind everyone what they are supposed to say when asked questions such as "what is your facility's disaster plan" etc. I once worked with an older pharmacist who claimed that the best way to kill a relative was to put them in a nursing home. I realize that is not the case for some facilities, but it is true for many.

-- Bill S. (Bill_S3@juno.com), February 06, 1999.


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