Establishment of Hospital Emergency Incident Command System (HEICS) in Iranian Hospitals: A Necessity for Better Response to Disasters

Preparing and increasing efficiency in hospitals in disasters need to launch a common protocol named Hospital Emergency Incident Command System (HEICS). HEICS provide more coordination between hospitals and other institutions involved in emergency incidents by utilizing logical management structure, duty descriptions, creating clear reporting channels as well as developing a common and simple nomenclature system. Researches indicated that applying and establishing HEICS is necessity for Iranian hospitals and it can be helpful for use in both emergency and non-emergency situations, such as moving the facilities dispensing medications to hospital staff, or planning for a large hospital or community event. Developing training program on HEICS for hospital managers as well as establishing it seems necessary regarding our country's condition. In this paper we point out establishing HEICS have to be in agenda for policy maker's managers in Iranian health system and affiliated hospitals. Critical incidents are sudden, unanticipated events or situations that require quick decisions. Experiences from all around the world show that confusion and chaos are the most common issues which are confronted in hospitals when there is a serious crisis (1). Clearly a timely and effective management system with accurate organization and proactive plans and activities could minimize negative consequences of such incidents and maximize efficiency of emergency services (2-4). Incident command system (ICS) is currently the most common system of incident management in the world, gaining more recognition due to its successful outcomes (2, 4). In ICS, the incident commander, is responsible for directing other peoples to be well organized and involved. ICS is founded on some basic principles, which ensure using resources effectively, and on the other hand, reduce disturbances in decision making and doing proper operations, by responsible organizations (5). In other words, successful response to crisis requires coordination among all hospital wards and units as well as collaboration with pre-hospital emergency forces (such as EMS, Red Crescent agency), police, firefighting in order to make sure communication lines are established. Although certain level of flexibility needed to respond to variety of crisis (6). Instead of ICS, preparing and increasing efficiency in hospitals in such circumstances, a common protocol named Hospital Emergency Incident Command System (HEICS) has been proposed which is extracted from basis ICS (2). HEICS was created in the late 1980s as an important foundation for the 5815 registered hospitals in the United States in their efforts to prepare for and respond to various types …