Franciscan Alliance’s five Northern Indiana hospital campuses were among those statewide that participated in an anthrax emergency preparedness drill on June 16. Besides hospitals, emergency management agencies and health departments combined efforts to take care of the most patients as quickly as possible, said Lori Postma, emergency preparedness coordinator at Franciscan Health Munster, who is shown coordinating the drill there.
In the exercise, the hospitals received and treated simulated anthrax patients, ranging from those who were treated and released to others in critical condition. The drills were evaluated by observers who later discussed how the exercises went and what could be learned from them, in order to ensure the best performance in the face of a real-life situation.
