I find it humorous that I can take a room full of clinicians and they don’t blink an eye when you tell them we’re going to run a megacode but tell them we’re going to activate the Hospital Incident Command System (HICS) and use it, look out. 
Eyes glaze over, beads of sweat appear on brows and slight trembling can be noted. Pull out the box of HICS vests and two boxes of HICS forms and people all of a sudden get important text messages they just have to take.
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Alright maybe I have exaggerated slightly but the bottom line is a great number of hospital personnel are not comfortable when it comes to using the HICS. My new book, Healthcare Emergency Incident Management Operations Guide is designed to correct that problem. In addition I’ve developed a Train-the-Trainer class to go with the guide which will allow you to build up your internal HICS instructor cadre and better incorporate HICS throughout your emergency preparedness program. It also includes initial incident action plan samples for a variety of events and simple exercises.
I teach a good deal of HICS courses to clients and I think this Operations Guide represents a significant leap forward in HICS education. I boil the HICS down to what healthcare organizations need to know and be functional with the tool. Can vests and forms be useful in some cases, yes. But I suggest in the majority of events you’ll do just fine with a good working knowledge of how the HICS is supposed to work. Adopting the HICS makes sense for a major teaching hospital or a critical access facility. The Train-the-Trainer option lets me work with your selected staff to refresh their existing HICS skills and give them some new methods to help others become more comfortable with the HICS.
If you’d like to explore putting your staff in charge of institutionalizing the HICS within your organization contact me at abetteremergency@gmail.com, it just may be easier than you thought.
I am affiliated with an agency that happens to use eICS. I am running on the assumption that the two products pretty much apples to apples, but I haven’t really spent time with either product.
Do you have anything to offer on the relative strengths of HICS vs eICS, or vice-versa?
Regards,
Randy S.
I am not familiar with the eICS Randy. If you are referring to the USCG IMS app it is just a nice handbook app for using the ICS. Relative to looking at the Hospital Incident Command System (HICS) versus the Incident Command System is a bit more complicated. HICS was ther result of an effort to make the ICS more hospital-friendly and allow people who don’t use the ICS on a regular basis to refer to job action sheets, etc. My opinion is that in spite of the intent of making the ICS easier, the HICS only complicates what is a pretty straightforward and flexible tool. If a person learns how to use the ICS properly you understand it is discipline blind. Organizations must also take on the ownership of making the ICS customized to their organization and way of doing business. For example, there is no need to use the FEMA or EMSACA message form when the organization already has a form they use to pass messages internally. If an organization wants to have job task descriptions and guides they should mirror positions and functions within the organization and not try and ask employees to take on a foreign function in the middle of a major emergency. Did I answer your question Randy?
Randy,
As I know them, HICS and eICS are two different things.
HICS is the Hospital Incident Command System. It takes the standard ICS and modified it to better reflect the management of a hospital during an incident or event. HICS is a product of the California Hospital Association
( https://www.calhospitalprepare.org/hics )
eICS is a web-based tool used to help manage the incident or event. Provides for electronic notification of staff and assigning them to positions. When the are assigned to the position you can automatically assign objectives to them, or during the course of the incident or event, you can assign an objective and they receive a notification. eICS uses the HICS as the basis for its org chart and Job Action Sheets (objectives).
If you are using a mobile device, you can complete objectives and it will add an entry to the event log which generates a complete accounting of actions taken.
eICS is one of a suite of products offered by Intermedix ( https://www.intermedix.com/ ) . Here in Michigan we use the eICS, Resource Tracking for bed availability for Acute Care and Long Term Care facilities, and Patient Tracking from scene to hospital and to another hospital if needed. In GR and the surrounding counties (Michigan Region 6 Healthcare Coalition) we use the Patient Tracking daily for ED notifications of inbound EMS traffic.
At Spectrum Health, we do not wait for a incidents to occur, we utilize eICS to manage down time events, service interruptions and recently used it to manage the transfer a large number of patients from one LTAC to another.
I am not affiliated with the company nor am I a sales person, we just happen to use the products. Please feel free to ask any other questions you may have.
Be Safe,
Warren
Thanks Warren.