A clear channel in an emergency

UPMC Northwest staff member prepared to keep lines of communication open.

Editor’s note: September is National Preparedness Month. Throughout the month, Extra! has highlighted emergency preparedness activities undertaken by the health system and its staff members.

Julie Bowers was just 13 years old in the spring of 1985 when a tornado roared through her rural neighborhood in Hermitage, Mercer County.

Miraculously, her childhood home, where her parents still live, was not damaged, but the homes of several neighbors were destroyed.

It took a week to restore electrical service to the area. And in that dark interim, amateur radio operators, or “ham” radio operators as they are often called, were the only communication links to the outside world.

That early experience with a major natural disaster played a large role in shaping the life of Ms. Bowers, a respiratory therapist at UPMC Northwest, and her involvement in emergency preparedness activities.

In addition to serving as a member of the decontamination team at UPMC North-west, Ms. Bowers is a member of her region’s Disaster Medical Assistance Team (DMAT). Under the control of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, DMATs are regional groups of volunteer medical professionals and support personnel with the ability to move quickly into a disaster area and provide medical care.

“My most recent assignment was at a logistics center in Maryland during Hurricane Katrina packing up medical supplies,” says Ms. Bowers, who has worked at UPMC Northwest for 11 years.

Taking the ‘plunge’

For Ms. Bowers, volunteer work with DMAT spurred a keen interest in another emergency preparedness activity.
“At our training sessions, a number of the volunteers were always talking about repeaters (a receiver/transmitter that listens for transmission and re-transmits it), power supply, and other radio jargon. I decided, ‘That’s it. I’m going to take the plunge and get my license as an amateur radio operator,’” says Ms. Bowers.

Amateur radio operators are licensed in the United States by the Federal Communications Commission and provide a number of public services. In fact, the FCC created the Amateur Radio Service to fill the need for a pool of experts who could provide communications backup during emergencies.

Ms. Bowers is ready to step in when needed. “In an emergency, I can help my hospital in many ways. If normal communications are out, a small team of amateur radio operators could keep communications open between the various departments,” she says. “That same team could ensure that external communications with other hospitals and suppliers of drinking water, generator fuel, and other essentials remain open.”

Ms. Bowers’ area of specialty as an amateur radio operator is getting radio signals to transmit as far as possible using a minuscule amount of power. The ability to remain in operation on small amounts of power, sometimes using a car battery, means that Amateur Radio Service operations can continue to transmit and receive long after most cellular telephones have depleted their power sources.

Ms. Bowers supports the recent decision by UPMC to post a Disaster Preparedness Profile on My HUB. The profile enables staff to list skills, experiences, and licensures that are not related to their employment at UPMC but may be useful in helping the health system develop disaster and emergency preparedness plans. Staff can update their emergency skills listing at any time by clicking on the Disaster Preparedness Profile link under the My Profile section of My HUB.

“Knowing and identifying resources that may be helpful must be a part of preparedness activities. I think it’s important for all staff to keep their Disaster Preparedness Profile up to date,” says Ms. Bowers.

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