CovidStats: Development and Implementation of a Daily COVID-19 Clinical Dashboard in an Urban Teaching Hospital.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Dashboards have been utilized in health care to improve quality and patient care. The purpose of our project was to create a concise, timely, and accurate dashboard for administrative and clinical leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic. METHODS: Two authors collaborated to identify 14 metrics and design a comprehensive dashboard (CovidStats, CS) using Microsoft Excel. The dashboard was updated daily and distributed to leadership between December 2020 and April 2021. The utility of this quality measure was assessed by survey of hospital leadership. RESULTS: The 14 metrics included were as follows: (1) elective surgery census threshold; (2) daily COVID admissions; (3) daily COVID discharges; (4) net COVID admissions; (5) ED (emergency department) bed holds; (6) COVID ED bed holds; (7) hospital census; (8) percent COVID census; (9) active COVID census; (10) COVID ICU (intensive care unit); (11) MICU (medical ICU) census; (12) ventilators in use; (13) high-flow oxygen devices in use; and (14) weekly hospital census. The leadership response survey revealed unanimous approval for CS, with a mean rating of 4.9 ± 0.3 (rated 1-5). CONCLUSIONS: Effective clinical dashboards can be created using affordable basic computer software. Implementation of the CS dashboard conveyed relevant and timely information, which influenced the decision making of hospital leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Radiological incident preparedness: planning at the local level.

Radiological terrorism has been recognized as a probable scenario with high impact. Radiological preparedness planning at the federal and state levels has been encouraging, but translating complex doctrines into operational readiness at the local level has proved challenging. Based on the authors' experience with radiological response planning for the City of Baltimore, this article describes an integrated approach to municipal-level radiological emergency preparedness planning, provides information on resources that are useful for radiological preparedness planning, and recommends a step-by-step process toward developing the plan with relevant examples from the experience in Baltimore. Local governmental agencies constitute the first line of response and are critical to the success of the operation. This article is intended as a starting framework for local governmental efforts toward developing a response plan for radiological incidents in their communities.