Martin Memorial Health Systems’ hurricane preparedness is a constantly evolving process. At the end of each hurricane season, debriefing and critiques are conducted to see what type of improvements can be made to our hurricane preparedness plan. The plan is then revised to incorporate improvements. Prior to June 1 (the official start of hurricane season) we conduct hurricane plan training for management team and Associates.

We have found that ensuring Associates are personally prepared for hurricanes is essential to our organizational preparedness. We focus on helping them think through their personal and family preparedness needs. Our goal is to ensure that our Associates and their families know what their personal plan is, so they are able to be mentally and physically ready to help our organization prepare for the hurricane, “ride out” the storm or recover from the event. Knowing their families are safe helps Associates be ready to perform their jobs without additional worries or distractions.

Managers are tasked with developing hurricane preparedness checklists for their own departments. A grid was developed to prompt thinking about departmental preparedness to include concepts such as staffing, logistics, accommodations, building preparation and communications. Checklists are prepared so everyone in the department knows what to do at each storm phase, from tropical storm watch through hurricane warning.

One of the bigger improvements that Martin Memorial incorporated into the hurricane plan is communications to and from staff. Associates are trained to call the internal “Hurricane Hot Line” to hear about organizational updates, and to call their managers’ voicemail to learn about their reporting duties.

Managers update their voicemail message frequently to provide important information to their Associates. Additionally, Associates know to tune to certain radio and TV stations for updates on the organization. An internal newsletter called the “Hurricane Hotsheet” is published daily with information about the organization, as well as community resources that are available to Associates and their families during the storm recovery phase. This has been a very successful improvement and has served the organization well.