Grande Ronde Hospital’s new decontamination team completed some essential training during a drill held at the hospital on Thursday, July 31. A half-dozen La Grande Boy Scouts volunteered to be processed by the team through the Hospital’s decontamination trailer. It was a great learning experience for the new team.
In January 2014, the new decontamination team was established under the oversight of the Incident Preparedness Subcommittee (IPS) to utilize staff in the Environmental Services (ES) Department. For the past six months, Dean Marcum from the State of Oregon’s Hospital Preparedness Program, JB Brock from Union County Emergency Services and Corky Gillies from La Grande EMS have assisted members of the new team with comprehensive training.
“The ES team has excelled in their new role and worked hard since January to complete monthly classes and drills. Thursday’s event was their first full scale drill and signifies the official transition from the previous team to this new team,” explained April Brock, the Hospital’s IPS chair.
Grande Ronde Hospital is committed to being prepared to respond to emergencies within the community. It routinely activates its incident command system throughout the year and periodically conducts drills.