A real hospital, real doctors, real ambulances...but today, the patients are fake.
Women and Children's Hospital of Buffalo manned two command centers, one at the old hospital campus on Bryant Street, and another at the new Oishei Children's Hospital on Ellicott Street.
Inside each command center were representatives from the hospitals, AMR, Erie County Public Health and the City of Buffalo. Inside, they monitored the transport of about a dozen acting patients, tracking their every move and journey to Oishei Children's Hospital.
Actors portrayed patients with varying conditions: babies from the NICU, children in critical condition from the ICU and expecting mothers. They were given a wrist band, placed on a stretcher from their hospital room, moved to the entrance of the hospital, their wristbands were scanned at the door, then loaded into an AMR ambulance and transported to the new hospital campus.
The goal of this practice exercise was to work out any logistical errors, prepare for issues that may arise and practice the routes ambulances will follow.
"We're vetting a lot of issues, both things that are happening in real time and injects that are being called into the command center to test us today," says Timothy Kornacki, Emergency Manager for Kaleida Health.
As for whether or not patients and families should be worried about the actual move on November 10th, President of Women and Children's Hospital, Allegra Jaros says, "They should be confident. We have the best transport team that does this every single day."