Data Collection And Analysis Paper

Almost every year a hurricane blast through Florida and takes its toll on the business, industry and affects the lives and dollars of the company and its workers. One can ask themselves, "How do we prevent this from happening again?" This is usually what businesses and persons affected by a hurricane ask each other. What about a hospital? How would a hospital prepare for a hurricane? To complicate things more, how would a hospital prepare for a hurricane if the hospital is to operate 24 hours a day? This is the question that Pierre, Keith, Carol, Getta and James have proposed.

In order to address this type of question our group had to conduct research. We had to develop a research process. We decided to use the management-research hierarchy model as a basis for our research. The initial research that was conducted was informational. The informational research was to find out how other hospitals react to a hurricane. The problem with this type of search was that a hospital will not have a specific hurricane plan. We had to change our informational outlook. In other words we expanded our search category.

A hurricane is considered a disaster. To be specific it is a natural disaster. So we all searched, "How a hospital prepares for a natural disaster". Bingo, we found numerous resources concerning hospitals and how they prepare for these types of incidents. The fist article was titled, "Hospital Disaster Preparedness: Meeting a Requirement or Preparing for the Worst?"(Paul V. Richter [PVR], 1997). This article explained in detail a hospital plan for disaster in West Columbia, SC. The article was written as a basic manual for all hospitals to follow. It was submitted to South Carolina Hospital Association as a guide. Many things are explained in this article. It explained in detail how the different departments within a medical facility should handle disastrous situations.

Next we need to find out specific data concerning hurricanes. Hurricanes cause major disaster to the area that they occur every year. Researching on the internet we found a website that explained the years that hurricanes occur and to what extent the hurricane caused destruction. The article was titled, "ALTERED BUILDING CLASSIFICATIONS FOR A HURRICANE LOSS ESTIMATION MODEL", (Makola M. Abdullah, Shealy C. Gross, Terri R. Norton, G. Dale Wesson [MMASCGTRNGDW], 2005). This article was designed with data in mind it described in detailed charts and graphs how buildings are prepared and built to withstand hurricanes. The most vital part of this article was that it provided us with data on hurricanes, damage bands and loss estimation.

This was very important because we can now use actual data and create criteria for new data. In other words, we can analyze the data presented in this article and used it to show new data to support our idea proposed. We also needed information or data to support or information. In other words we needed to show a cost to associate with our information. Remember a hospital is a business so we needed to show much a hurricane could cost. We also needed to show what equipment a hospital would need to function during a hurricane. This is vital in our presentation people need to see data but more importantly associate it with the cost.

Hurricane Katrina was the worst ever catastrophe, with losses exceeding 34 billion and estimated to reach 160 billion. Such being the case, hospital administration have to best decide how to expend significant amounts of money for prior damages, and at the same time decide on the upcoming active hurricane season. The magnitude of cost associated with the cost hurricane repairs, the replacement of furnishings, equipment and supplies. If an organization is likely to be impacted by a storm, the importance of being prepared with a seven day supply of supplies should become a priority, especially in the medical field.

We found some more articles relating to our presentation, "Emergency Planning after Hurricane Katrina: Using Task Analysis with Observational Studies to Simulate Hospital Evacuations", (C.W. Johnson [CWJ], 2005). This paper analyzed the data taken form New Orleans natural disaster hurricane Katrina. The lack of appropriate evacuation plans forced