Last Wednesday, Herkimer County Public Health and Little Falls Hospital delivered nearly 1,000 flu shots to first responders, governmental officials and employees, healthcare professionals, other licensed and essential personnel, and volunteers from the Red Cross and other organizations throughout Herkimer County. The flu shot delivery and distributions were part of a point of distribution (POD) drill. Another POD drill took place last Friday in Old Forge. Herkimer County Public Health’s partner in these drills is Little Falls Hospital, which held a drill for the same groups. Important planning was accomplished at meetings of Herkimer County Public Health, Little Falls Hospital Emergency Preparedness Staff, Herkimer Chapter of the American Red Cross, Herkimer Office of Emergency Services, and with advice and counsel of New York State Department of Health. This year’s POD drill is practice for what might be necessary if Herkimer County ever faced the avian influenza, or pandemic influenza, or some bioterrorism event. The shared goal of Herkimer County Public Health and Little Falls Hospital is to learn how it might deliver 65,000 doses of vaccine or pills to all Herkimer County residents in three days. The 2006 target groups were expanded to include others in the infrastructure of Herkimer County – teachers, pharmacists, dentists, veterinarians, librarians, religious leaders, and the press, in addition to the traditional first responder community. Another goal is to practice teamwork between Public Health and Little Falls Hospital. Collaboration on supplies, vaccines, personnel, paperwork, and planning is just the type of practice that makes a POD drill successful. Each year, unexpected events lead to important training lessons. This year, the supply of vaccine from New York State Department of Health has been delayed, and the POD would have needed to be postponed, if Public Health had not planned ahead and ordered an extra 1,000 doses for the clinic. “We’ve learned to expect problems with supply of flu vaccine, and we’re glad we planned for a shortage when we ordered our flu vaccine last April,” said Public Health Prevention Supervisor Jill Barra. Other unexpected problems included some incorrect publicity about target groups. Little Falls Hospital Infection Control Nurse Patty Seifried has planned the Little Falls Hospital POD, which has included implementing the new computer scanning forms that Herkimer County Public Health is using. “Each person must fill in a scanning form, which then will be entered in a database,” Seifried said. “These systems are adaptable to other uses, and the practice we all will get in this POD drill is priceless.” The new scanning system includes the use of bar code scanners to speed up registration and delivery of the vaccine or whatever medication or treatment the POD might need to deliver to the residents of Herkimer County. The practice and planning to safely treat all 65,000 Herkimer County residents in three days is the continuing goal of these now yearly exercises. Planning will begin in January for the POD drill for the fall of 2007. Herkimer County officials are expected to be in attendance. As part of the planning and implementation of the POD drill, Administrator James Wallace issued an acknowledgement of the emergency preparedness drill, and a joint information center and press conference was held at 2 p.m. at the Herkimer Methodist Church, the site of the Herkimer drill.
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