Public Health Policy: A Terrorist Attack Against The United States Have Risen

Public Health Policy
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The threats of a terrorist attack against the United States have risen. This is a threat to the national security. What this means is that the health sector will not be left behind, it will be affected adversely. Measures of how to handle the situation concerning the health of the people should, therefore, be put into place with an immediate effect. This report is a proposal of ways through which the situation will be handled in the public sector.
According to the ten essentials of public health services, it is required that the hospital monitors to identify the health issues affecting the community. The hospital is also required to come up with policies and plans that are helpful in solving the health issues in the community. Education and empowerment of the community about their health should come from the health facilities. The hospital should also engage in the research of innovations or insights that can solve problems concerning the health of the community. During the emergency, it will require the hospital to work extra hard to meet the needs of the community. It will have to come up with ways as quick as possible to handle the situation.
It is a sure event that the surge capacity during the emergency will strain the hospital now that it is already operating at its peak. The medical staff especially the specialties to attend to some special emergencies will be strained. This is why the hospital has to alleviate this by employing the use of personnel of Emergency Medical Services (EMS). The issue of space can be handled by the hospital discharging patients who are not in critical condition and stopping elective admissions for some time. The hallways of the inpatient, Emergency Department and areas that are nonclinical can also be prepared to accommodate the large numbers. The hospital can also arrange with the other hospital at a distant to transfer the existing inpatients so as to create more room. It will also be crucial for the hospital to create awareness of the impending disaster to the community so that they can take precautions.
According to EMTALA, any casualty who finds their way to the emergency department must be treated or stabilized with no regard to their inability to pay or having insurance. EMTALA requires the hospitals to screen a patient who comes in the emergency department to find out the medical condition in order to determine the required treatment regardless of the patient's ability to pay for the services. The hospitals are also required to stabilize the condition of a patient to its level best of capabilities. In case the hospital cannot provide stabilization, it should arrange for proper transfer to another hospital and lastly in case transfer is done to the hospital, it should accept (Harris, 2016).
It is, therefore, importance to evaluate patients during an emergency to provide the necessary treatment since most patients in America lack insurance or others are underinsured. This is in spite of the coverage of expansions under Affordable Care Act, and it affects so many Americans. EMTALA works to avoid the cases in the hospitals that results to the dumping or rejecting the underinsured or uninsured patients. Through this, unnecessary deaths will be avoided.
Recording keeping of the patients’ information matters a lot to ensure accuracy and correctness in care provision. It is the reason why the United States decided to make a shift from the use of papers to electronic record keeping. Electronic record keeping matters a lot because it is a very efficient method of keeping records. It is easily accessible and of less cost. It improves the quality of medical care as well as aiding in medical errors prevention. However, there are risks of intrusion to the patients' information. It will be a common problem, especially during the emergency. The laws of HIPAA require that there is trust between the patient and the doctor. Information security maintenance is something that cannot be done by the doctors alone and therefore measures to maintain the systems should be put in place.
The first measure is putting security measures into place. This involves hiring information security systems personnel. The role of information security manager is very crucial in protecting information in the electronic record keeping systems. Their role will be to protect the hospital's data, networks, and computers. They protect them from external intrusions such as hackers, impending security breaches and virus in the computer. The intrusions can lead to the loss of vital patients' information which can lead to the facility being charged against data loss (Ian, 2017).
The other measure that can be taken is to formulate and write down policies that govern the usage of the system by the staff. Before the creation of the policies, the staff should be trained thoroughly on how to use the electronic record keeping system. But before training the staff, the system should first be thoroughly developed, made credible by working out all the flaws and allowing the staff to familiarize with the system. The written policies should then follow and then be explained to the staff. They should contain a statement that briefly describes the electronic record keeping system. It should then describe the creation and maintenance of the system. The policies should then in...