Emergency events are disruptive. Whether acutely impactful and short-term, negligible and protracted, or any mix thereof, these incidents alter healthcare organizations’ abilities to consistently deliver safe and effective care. While potentially devastating, emergencies are also unique opportunities for exemplary leadership and unprecedented innovation. COVID-19, ransomware, and active shooters are, respectively, a few of the myriad natural, technological, and intentional emergency events that healthcare organizations, and their leaders, face. While clinical, operational and financial impacts of emergencies are countless, so too, are their solutions.
This course explores the structures, processes and outcomes of healthcare emergency management through an applied leadership case study approach. Beginning with the fundamentals and origins of healthcare emergency management, we will explore, using peer-reviewed journal articles and case studies, a comprehensive, all-hazards leadership approach to managing events that negatively impact healthcare delivery. We will examine strategies to synthesize, evaluate and apply healthcare emergency management principles in the context of proven leadership techniques, from regulations and accreditation standards to Colin Powell’s, “My Thirteen Rules” and Peter Drucker’s, “What Makes an Effective Executive.”