I4 Extending HAN Beyond Emergency Response

In order to receive the 25.5 Continuing Education Credits for this conference, please click

Training and Continuing Education Online

Wednesday, August 24, 2011: 1:00 PM-2:30 PM
Hanover C/D/E
This panel will explore ways to involve non-traditional emergency responders in HAN activities. Panelists will describe innovative programs and approaches to using jurisdictional HANs to reach a wider public health audience and how this new audience could be utilized in emergency situations.
The Panel will explore the some of the ways State and Local Health Departments can really emphasize the NETWORK in Health Alert Network by extending the use of a HAN beyond Emergency Preparedness and into the day-to-day activities of public health.  Panel members will give examples on how they have expanded the use their HAN and how others might achieve similar success.  Panelists will discuss successes and obstacles they encountered in their approaches to expanding the reach of their respective Health Alert Networks.

Specifically the panel will focus on key elements needed to make your HAN a success; how to create the vision, identify stakeholders, prioritize projects and identify resources, how to develop key relationships with stakeholders, develop a training and outreach plan, monitor and evaluate your program to identify gaps and implement results, what messages to communicate to gain support to sustain your program. 

Topics include:

-       The Illinois Department of Public Health has expanded the use of their HAN by delegating administrative rights to Local Health Department and other Public Health partners.  This empowers each entity to improve their internal and external communications and creates buy-in to the state-wide HAN effort.

-       The Ohio Department of Health has focused on networking and developing partnerships to improve information sharing in the public health community.  This includes engaging hospitals in

-       The California Department of Public Health is adding all health care facilities (hospitals, long-term care, community and Indian Health clinics) along with other medical and emergency response stakeholders to the State’s alerting system that currently consists of over 33,000 participants. This expansion has significantly enhanced communications and resulted in over 5,600 alerts sent in 2009 to keep stakeholders better informed.

The panel will also allow time for audience members to ask questions of the panel.

See more of: Panels