Public Health Emergency: Preparedness, Policies and Community Health

This assignment presents a discussion on public health emergency preparedness and policy. It explores existing measures at the state and local levels, highlighting collaboration between various entities like HEICS, the Department of Public Health, and the Metropolitan Medical Response System. The discussion also covers communication strategies for different threats, such as anthrax and influenza, managed by the CDC. It suggests policy changes for preparedness, including prevention, mitigation, and recovery procedures, as well as partnerships with local clinics and hospitals. The assignment further delves into effective policy-making models based on equity and effectiveness, using the example of raising awareness for healthy living. It proposes key steps like recruiting social health workers and offering routine check-up camps to promote community health management.

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08 Mar 2019
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Discussion 1
The measures available in the state and local community are connected at jurisdictional level as
well as with Federal entities and provide sufficient protection. This is because the existing
program include collaboration between HEICS, Department of Public Health (level I and II
trauma centers), and Metropolitan Medical Response System (Love, et al., 2016) and respond
immediately for any emergency health condition. The communication for different threats, for
example anthrax virus and H1B1 influenza management is managed by CDC, to collaborate with
other hospitals in the locality.
Support system is mainly presented by CDC and preparedness is responded by EMS, fire
department for ambulatory services, and other hospitals. Changes for preparedness policy
include (i) prevention, mitigation and recovery procedure; (ii) preparedness of science and
technology for emerging threats; and (iii) partnership with local clinics and hospitals (Brencic, et
al., 2017). Political and social factor include decision from local health authority and declaration
of emergency by CDC and Federal government. Environment factor include collaborative effort
such that available resources can be used for control and prevention of imminent threat.
Discussion 2
The effective model for policy making should be based on equity and effectiveness. For example
healthy living awareness must be facilitated because it will benefit the community members by
offering them knowledge about self-health and the corresponding burden on healthcare
professionals will be reduced. Equity model in this context will make the benefits available for
all-class and all-age groups (Pitt, Monks, Crowe & Vasilakis, 2016).
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Correspondingly, both policy model will raise satisfaction level among the community members
and are aimed to produce worthy clinical outcomes for community health management.
However, contrasting these models, from economic perspective, effectiveness is fruitful in all
situational context, but equality is not worthy in situations “cutting sickness benefits” or
“retirement age”.
Chosen health policy:
Raising awareness of community members for adopting healthy lifestyle behaviors.
Additional key steps:
(i) Recruitment of social health workers who can visit school, colleges, and offices to deliver tips
on healthy lifestyle adoption with emphasis on food, physical activity, and avoiding harmful
substance use such as alcohol and nicotine (Koniak-Griffin, et al., 2015).
(ii) Offering routine check-up camps in locality, such that community members can avail the free
checkup facility on periodical basis. This will be helpful in giving additional tips to individuals
for health management.
References
Brencic, D. J., Pinto, M., Gill, A., Kinzer, M. H., Hernandez, L., & Pasi, O. G. (2017). CDC
support for global public health emergency management. Emerging infectious
diseases, 23(Suppl 1), S183.
Koniak-Griffin, D., Brecht, M. L., Takayanagi, S., Villegas, J., Melendrez, M., & Balcázar, H.
(2015). A community health worker-led lifestyle behavior intervention for Latina
(Hispanic) women: Feasibility and outcomes of a randomized controlled
trial. International journal of nursing studies, 52(1), 75-87.
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Assignment Name Student ID
Love, J. S., Karp, D., Delgado, M. K., Margolis, G., Wiebe, D. J., & Carr, B. G. (2016). National
differences in regional emergency department boarding times: are US emergency
departments prepared for a public health emergency?. Disaster medicine and public
health preparedness, 10(4), 576-582.
Pitt, M., Monks, T., Crowe, S., & Vasilakis, C. (2016). Systems modelling and simulation in
health service design, delivery and decision making. BMJ Qual Saf, 25(1), 38-45.
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