Healthcare Emergency Managers Face Stiffer Standards

In the years since 9/11, compliance standards for emergency managers in hospitals and other healthcare facilities have become more comprehensive and stringent. Now a new report says they will face even tougher standards in 2009.

In an article on the Homeland 1 website, Mitch Saruwatari says the Joint Commission, the Oak Brook, Ill.–based organization that accredits the nation’s hospitals, has now created a separate chapter for emergency management, and the new chapter of standards will become effective Jan. 1, 2009.

“These standards will be assembled under one chapter, rather than being scattered through all of the other standards, and many will address new areas in hospital emergency management,” Saruwatari says. “Overall, the changes indicate the importance of maintaining an effective healthcare response capability that is intimately linked with response agencies to provide care and services to the community.”

But while most hospitals agree with the standards, Saruwatari says many are having a difficult time coming into compliance quickly enough. Some of the standards the Joint Commission introduced in 2008, in fact, were postponed to help healthcare organizations come into compliance and therefore won’t go into effect till next year. While these standards will still be cited during surveys, they will not impact accreditation status until Jan. 1, 2009.

What does that mean for 2009? Saruwatari says all emergency management–related standards, including those that emergency managers have been given a little extra time to implement, will be combined into a stand-alone chapter separate from the Joint Commission's Environment of Care standards.

“While this will certainly help organizations better meet Joint Commission rules, it will put additional challenges on the individual currently responsible for maintaining a hospital’s emergency management program,” he adds.