[PBARC] May 20th Hospital Exercise Information

[E Glenn Wolf Jr]

*Greetings to the Hospital Preparedness Coordinators,*

There has been much discussion and preparation work done for the coming 
statewide exercise on May 20th.  As we approach this date I wanted to 
offer some information and directions regarding the use of ham radio in 
the hospital both for this event and in general preparation for any 
emergency requiring supplemental communications support.

*Priority of use.*
Ham radio is a valuable communication asset due to the ability of* 
trained and experienced *operators to reconfigure the communication 
network on the fly to adapt to changing mission requirements or 
situations.  The ham operators that will be working with you are serious 
volunteers who are working hard to extend their skills and 
qualifications to support your communications needs.

Federal Communications Commission Rules require that we observe some 
limits on how we use ham radio in the hospital environment.  Ham radio 
cannot be used in place of properly licensed business and emergency 
service radio systems.  The equipment must be operated by or under the 
supervision of an FCC licensed amateur radio operator of Technician 
class or higher.  _Under normal operating rules, ham radio would be the 
last system you would turn to when every other communication system has 
failed or been rendered less than functional by overload or 
infrastructure damage._  For the purpose of exercises, we can use ham 
radio as required, provided the ham radio operators are not being asked 
to perform communications in support of routine hospital operations.  
For example paging personnel or ordering ordering housekeeping or 
maintenance staff operations.  These types of communications may not be 
done over ham radio frequencies.
_
_*Training requirements.*
To allow the radio operators to be familiar with  your internal 
operational procedures, you need to establish a working relationship 
with  local hams in your area and have them participate in training and 
exercises with your staff.  These trained volunteer communicators can 
then serve as a supplement to your usual communication staff during 
emergencies.  Only by practicing together can your staff and the 
communication volunteers merge together effectively in an emergency.  
Your staff will _not_ have time to train an inexperience volunteer at 
that point, as they will be focussed entirely on getting the situation 
taken care of.

Some hospitals have ham operators on staff already.  This allows your 
facility to make use of the ham radio system during the initial period 
of any emergency event.  In the aftermath of an emergency event it will 
take some time for the outside radio volunteers to see to the safety of 
their homes and families before responding to your location.  _You will 
still need to have a group of outside volunteers to support your 
communications requirements._  Your staff ham operators will be needed 
at their regular duties as any emergency response progresses.

The radio personnel need to have more experience that just the class to 
obtain a license to be effective communicators in your facility.  The 
use of ham radio involves interacting with established network protocols 
and procedures that a newly licensed operator may not be familiar with.  
For this reason Arkansas - ARES has established a *Training and 
Certification Standard* that the field deployable (to your hospital) 
operators are required to meet.  As the Tactical Communications  
Coordinator for the Preparedness and Emergency Response Branch of 
Arkansas Department of Health, I strongly encourage you to require your 
radio operators to participate in the ARES Training and Certification 
program.

Certified ARES operators will have completed the following:

    NIMS courses  (Arkansas - ARES is committed to be NIMS compliant.)

        IS-100
        IS-200
        IS-700
        IS-800

    Amateur Radio Emergency Communications Course from ARRL.

        AREC-01 (or equivalent)

The NIMS courses you are familiar with, the AREC-01 course is basic 
training on the role of an ham radio emergency communication volunteer.  
The course is available from the Amateur Radio Relay League (ARRL) for a 
modest cost.  This level of training is essential to your overall 
operational success.  I strongly urge you to adopt this as your in house 
training requirement for radio communication volunteers even if your 
radio volunteers are not affiliated with Arkansas - ARES.

*Contact Information*

Some hospital locations have already made these arrangements with the 
local radio club and/or Amateur Radio Emergency Services (ARES) 
coordinator.  For those who do not have such an arrangement, a listing 
of the *ARES District Emergency Coordinators* is included here.  Each of 
these people should serve as your_* first contact point *_for locating 
_qualified ham radio operators_ in your community if you do not have an 
existing arrangement with your local ham radio group.  Each of these 
people has supervisory responsibility for the ham radio volunteer 
activity in a multi county area.  The hospital has the ultimate say in 
the matter of who will operate the radio equipment in the facility, but 
beyond that these contact people are your best coordinated source for 
radio communication volunteers.  They may in turn refer your request to 
a county level coordinator that works with them to arrange for local 
operators at you location.  If you need communication support at _ANY_ 
time these are the people you should have in your list of emergency 
contacts in your area.  The Preparedness and Emergency Response Branch 
of ADH encourages  you to take advantage of this pool of volunteer 
support for your emergency communications needs by contacting the ARES 
District Emergency Coordinator for your county to arrange for your radio 
volunteer support in your hospital.

Georgia Seward  -  Georgia.Seward at baptist-health.org  -  501-202-7950
 
Counties

    Faulkner
    Lonoke
    Pulaski
    Saline


Kenny Thompson  -  kg5ks at arrl.net    -  870-503-0802

Counties

    Cleburne
    Independence
    Jackson
    Lawrence
    Sharp
    White

Travis Williams  -  n5jfd at arrl.net  -   870-931-8743

Counties

    Clay
    Craighead
    Greene
    Mississippi
    Poinsett
    Randolph

Terry Busby  -  w5ars at hotmail.com

Counties

    Crittenden
    Cross
    Lee
    Monroe
    Phillips
    Prairie
    St. Francis
    Woodruff

Glenn Wolf  -  egwolfjr at email.com  -   870-692-3846

Counties

    Arkansas
    Cleveland
    Desha
    Grant
    Jefferson
    Lincoln

Joe Giddens  -  n5ioz at arrl.net  -   870-918-1157

Counties

    Ashley
    Bradley
    Calhoun
    Chicot
    Dallas
    Drew
    Ouachita
    Union

Don Hale  -  kb5ssw-1 at sbcglobal.net  -  870-898-2871

Counties

    Columbia
    Hempstead
    Howard
    Lafayette
    Little River
    Miller
    Nevada
    Sevier

Mark T. Clayton  -  hamsat1 at cox.net  -  479-648-9343

Counties

    Crawford
    Franklin
    Logan
    Scott
    Sebastian

Kenneth Hamm  -  whamm407 at sbcglobal.net  -   501-354-4989

Counties

    Conway
    Johnson
    Perry
    Pope
    Van Buren
    Yell

Bob King  -  w5lvb at arrl.net -  501-767-1908

Counties

    Clark
    Garland
    Hot Spring
    Montgomery
    Pike
    Polk

Bill Smith  -  bismith at uark.edu  -  479-443-9450

Counties

    Benton
    Carroll
    Madison
    Washington

If your county is not listed here or you are unable to contact the 
District Coordinator for your county, and you need ham radio contact 
assistance contact me directly.  I will do all that I can to locate 
someone in your area to assist you with your radio operations.  If you 
have any additional questions or needs, feel free to call me.

John Nordlund - AD5FU
Tactical Communication Coordinator
Preparedness and Emergency Response,  Mail Slot 61
 Arkansas Department of Health
 4815 West Markham Little Rock   AR    72205-3867

 Work Cell 501-231-7001
 Fax   501-280-4140

John.Nordlund at arkansas.gov