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Q&A: How do I ID those at risk for elopement during a disaster?

Emergency Management Alert, February 29, 2008

Q: Is there an emergency operations plan (EOP) standard for identifying those at risk for elopement during a disaster?

For the answer to the question below, we turned to The Greeley Company's safety consultant, Steven MacArthur.

There is a specific requirement under EC.4.15, Element of Performance #7 ("(t)he organization establishes processes for identifying residents susceptible to wandering once emergency measures are initiated"), but it only applies as a requirement to facilities surveyed under the standards for long-term care. That said, if a segment of your organization's patient population would be considered at risk for wandering, particularly during an emergency event, it would certainly be an appropriate risk management strategy to have something in place. In general, managing any nomadic patient population should be part of your organization's risk assessment process.

Presumably, there is already some assessment that would take into account any inclinations of patients to wander or elope and to mitigate those inclinations to the degree possible. In the event of an emergency, it may be necessary to go back to that assessment to ensure that, whatever event is occurring in the organization, there's been no status change that might increase the risk.

My gut says that if you have a solid assessment process to start with, then you're probably most of the way there. Again, the EP indicates the requirement as being the identification of patients that might be susceptible -- I'd focus on the assessment process (maybe do some spot follow-up monitoring to ensure that the process is effective) and go from there.

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