What are Hospital Emergency Codes?
Plenty of us have watched TV shows or movies with at least one scene in a hospital. From Scrubs to Grey’s Anatomy to Chicago Med, you’ve probably heard a character shout, “Code Red!” or “He’s coding!” plenty of times, but what do these “codes” actually mean?
Hospitals use a series of standardized codes to alert staff of various emergency situations within a medical institution. These can range from life threatening medical emergencies to missing patients. Some examples include:
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Code Purple (hostage situation)
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Code Amber (missing child)
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Code Pink (pediatric cardiac arrest)
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Code Orange (external disasters)
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Code Silver (active shooter)
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Code Black (bomb threat)
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Code Blue (cardiac arrest, otherwise known as “coding”)
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Code Green (precautionary or crisis evacuation event)
Codes are usually conveyed via beeper, phone, or PA system. The aim is not just to warn staff, but to mobilize them quickly. With how tehcnology has advanced though, we do question whether these manual methods are still the most effective. When every second counts, surely there are faster ways to get a crisis under control?
Consider Hyperautomation
What is “hyperautomation” exactly? Simply put, it’s when you automate basic or low-level tasks to streamline your workflow. AI or other technology handles the little things with precision so your staff can focus on their areas of expertise. No more interruptions means an improved work-life balance and increased productivity overall.
How Can it Help?
As you can imagine, evacuating a hospital is a very complex process. All hospital personnel and patients must be considered when creating an evacuation plan. Wards with special requirements (such as intensive care, neonatal, maternity, and pediatric) call for even more detailed procedures. Then you factor in all their visitors and things get very complicated, very quickly.
That's Where SimplyCast Comes In
Our expertise with hyperautomation and email marketing automation comes together in one easy-to-use platform. We provide you with a variety of tools, such as powerful alerts and advanced response-based tracking, all through one convenient centralized dashboard that keeps you in control.
In emergencies like an active shooter on the premises, you can launch your evacuation alert response with the click of a button. This prepared approach guarantees clear communication and calm instructions before panic can take over. Staying calm in a crisis is key to a successful evacuation, as chaos costs lives.
How Does it Work?
Easy! Our platform integrates with your existing systems, so there’s no need to upskill or invest in expensive proprietary hardware. With out app, anyone can take full advantage of even our most advanced features:
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Hospital administrations send automated messages to alert staff of the evacuation.
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Staff on the ground can use our live survey to share updates as the situation unfolds, allowing your team to strategize and mobilize in real time.
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Our live survey feature is also useful for contacting other hospitals regarding capacity. Find beds for your most vulnerable patients without wasting a second.
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Once the evacuation is over, automatically generated reports are available for you to review.
All this from one app, one dashboard, on your very own device.
Automation in Action:
Let’s look at an example. Sage Hospital requires a full evacuation, but alerting patients, visitors, and staff all at once would cause a panic. This could result in trampling injuries and possible fatalities, all of which could have been avoided with a well-organized system.
Sage Hospital’s administration team knows that a calm, orderly evacuation is the best way to keep everyone safe, so they use SimplyCast’s platform to take charge of the situation. With one discreet message, hospital staff can mobilize immediately.
Our live survey and response tracking features equip the administration team to request vital resources from other hospitals, all while monitoring the central dashboard for status updates as hospital staff evacuate each area.
Administrators can launch additional alerts (such as dangerous areas or new evacuation zones) or adjust plans as the situation changes, meaning Sage Hospital will stay ready no matter what comes their way.
Four Simple Steps
SimplyCast’s code green evacuation use case can be customized for every single hospital:
Step 1: Build Crisis Alerts
The alerts you broadcast will support hospital staff, patients, and visitors, so we advise having your administration team set them up ahead of time.
Begin with a simple template that makes the announcement and triggers staff protocols, and include only vital instructions regarding patient and staff safety.
By templating alert messages, you ensure consistent, concise, and accurate communication with the click of a button. These qualities go a long way in a crisis.
Step 2: Build Live Surveys
Consider what resources you might need during an evacuation, such as medical supplies, additional ambulances, empty beds for intensive care patients, or incubators for babies in need of extra support.
Have your administration team build live surveys requesting aid ahead of time.
Step 3: Activate Alert
Once you've prepared your message templates and your live surveys, you’re ready to test the alert. This is a vital step that gives you peace of mind, since you’ll know for sure that your alerts work. All you'll have to do is launch them in the event of an evacuation.
To perform a successful test:
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Have your administration team trigger the 'begin evacuation protocols' alert and send out live surveys to request aid (such as beds, supplies, and ambulances) from other hospitals.
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Your administration team should monitor our app's central dashboard to track responses and updates in real time.
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Hospital staff should keep the administration team informed about changes such as successfully evacuated areas, off-limits areas, and headcounts at the designated evacuation meeting area(s).
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After the evacuation, your administration team should send another alert, either to inform hospital staff that it is safe to re-enter the building, or with further instructions in the event the building will be unsafe long-term.
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Further alerts should be sent to neighbouring hospitals to let them know when critical care patients can return and to thank them for their cooperation.
Step 4: Review Process
Once the evacuation is over, our app will automatically generate reports that assess your staff’s emergency response and identify any issues. These should be carefully reviewed and their suggestions applied to your procedures. By putting your evacuation response through multiple drills, you can tighten future response times and be ready in the event of another alert.
Why SimplyCast?
The SimplyCast platform is a no-code platform that is fully customizable and can be scaled to meet the exact needs of every medical facility. Our platform can also be applied to other standardized codes in the hospital code system.
SimplyCast has achieved certification in ISO 27001, 27017, 27018, and TX-RAMP Level 2 and owns data centers in the USA and Canada. This means that your confidential data is safe on our secure server and the messages you transmit are completely encrypted. Our platform can send over 100,000 messages every hour and allows for over 10,000 concurrent sessions. We can also acquire additional gateways and servers if you need them.
Most importantly, we have a 99.5 percent minimum uptime. With our solution, you can have peace of mind.
Interested in Improving Your Code Green Response?
Don’t wait! Our experts are ready to give you a one-on-one demo to show you how this solution works. We also have more use cases for other hospital emergency codes, like code amber for emergencies where a possible child abduction or infant abduction has occurred, code silver for an active shooter, code orange for external disasters, code pink for an infant cardiac event, code blue for cardiac arrests, code purple for hostage situations, and code black for bomb threats.
Simply request a demo by clicking the button below and let us help you elevate your emergency response.
