After experiencing an active shooter situation just outside its facility in March, Rancho Mirage, Calif.-based Eisenhower Health began developing a communication network specifically for emergency and disaster response situations.
Eisenhower Health partnered with Mobile Heartbeat, a healthcare communications platform, after a former patient opened fire on the hospital campus March 4. Following the incident, Mobile Heartbeat compiled a report that comprised communication data analytics from the units that were affected. Around 80 people were evacuated from the hospital's campus during the incident, and its orthopedic unit was locked down for more than an hour prior to the evacuation. No patients or individuals were harmed during the event, except for the gunman, who was shot by police on the scene and later died.
The hospital is currently rolling out Mobile Heartbeat's clinical communications platform, which connects clinicians and operational staff across the healthcare enterprise by adding all their communication tools to a single mobile-based application. The platform supports phone call, texting, paging, video chat, nurse alerts, photography and broadcast functions.
With Mobile Heartbeat's platform, Eisenhower Health's security team can send emergency updates out instantaneously across the system. The hospital will also be able to designate necessary contact groups and leadership roles to support quicker deployment of the incident command center as well as enhanced protocol for bidirectional communication.
"Hospitals need to understand that communication is critical to inform all employees, all patients, everyone about what is happening during a critical situation," said Ann Mostofi, Eisenhower Health vice president of patient care services and chief nursing officer, according to the news release. "We have found that Mobile Heartbeat can be that source of inside 'truth,' with almost instantaneous communication about what is really happening."