Plan, Don't Panic
The other week I watched a show on the Discovery channel in disbelief. Called Pig Bomb, it described hoards of feral pigs roaming the Southeast. Locals may have cross-bred the American boar with its ill-tempered cousin, the Eurasian wild boar, for hunting. A six hundred pound, sixty mile per hour beast with tusks would be hard to shoot, never mind it panicking unarmed civilians. But I wonder if it's all as bad as it looks.
And so I ponder swine flu.
A threat of unknown impact is always unsettling, and certainly with H1N1 there is real concern. Hospitals strained to capacity will find it difficult to handle a sudden influx of patients with influenza-like illness while coping with their own staff getting ill.
Just the same, planning is smart, even if we don't know what this particular "pig bomb" will do. You should know your laboratory's plan, which may also include:
- Stockpiling – your hospital pandemic plan may include rapid influenza testing but also point of care testing to screen for other causes of influenza-like illness (ILI). Include backup suppliers in your plan as well as procedures in the event you have to change kit manufacturers.
- Staffing – if staff members become ill and need to stay home for a week or more, you need to have a plan to limit or reroute testing. This may include, for instance, formatting your test menu as reference lab tests in your information system ahead of time.
- Traffic – your hospital may have a plan or may have already started to reroute patient traffic, depending on symptoms. Many will come to your laboratory, and you'll want to be aware of parking and waiting room issues to make it easy as possible for your patients.
Not just planning but weekly planning meetings can help your laboratory adjust as events change. If you plan, you can avoid the panic.