By Sarah Green
KHI News Service
TOPEKA, Jan. 18
Many volunteer health care workers who descended on New York City after Sept. 11 weren”t able to help, even though Manhattan”s hospitals overflowed with patients.
Doctors, nurses and others found themselves turned away because officials coordinating the response effort had no way to verify the volunteers” credentials.
The Kansas Department of Health and Environment hopes to prevent that situation in the event of a mass disaster in the state by developing an advance registration system to help volunteer health professionals move quickly to affected areas that experience a “surge” in patients.
The Emergency System for the Advance Registration of Volunteer Health Professionals, referred to as “ESAR-VHP,” could be ready later this year, according to Mindee Reece, director of KDHE”s Center for Public Health Preparedness, who spoke about the initiative to the Senate Public Health and Welfare Committee on Thursday.
The U.S. Health Resources Services Administration, which awarded the state a $4.5 million grant for bioterrorism preparedness this year, requires that states receiving the funds utilize a standardized volunteer registration system that tracks volunteers” licenses, credentials, accreditation and privileges in hospitals and medical facilities.
If such a system had been in place, workers would have been able to respond more efficiently in states affected by Hurricane Katrina, said Larry Buening, executive director of the Kansas State Board of Healing Arts. And, health care workers who left Louisiana after the storm were unable to find permanent work without their credentials from that state”s board of health, which was inaccessible for several weeks.
A task force convened in 2006 continues to work on issues of reciprocal licensing and appropriate liability and worker”s compensation coverage, Reece said.
Sarah Green is a staff writer for KHI News Service, which specializes in coverage of health issues facing Kansans. She can be reached at
sgreen@khi.org
or at 785-233-5443, ext. 118.