When planning an MCI exercise, you must take several steps to coordinate a safe and productive exercise for all involved. The goal of an exercise is to test response capabilities and, typically, we test our ability to respond to specific types of incidents. Therefore, it is incumbent on exercise planners to maximize the effectiveness of the exercise by making sure that smaller, practical objectives can be tested and measured through realistic scenarios. This article highlights the issues surrounding the development of a realistic exercise plan. Use small and large exercises to regularly test components of your emergency response plan.
To maximize the effectiveness of your next EMS exercise, author Robert Delagi suggests the following steps for a better outcome:
- Pick the type of exercise.
- Establish an exercise team.
- Choose the incident type.
- Choose the location.
- Establish safety and other sectors.
Evaluators should keep written notes and ensure that their commentary is limited to judgment on the predetermined exercise objectives and in accordance with the standard operating procedures of the participating agencies. A member of the exercise team should facilitate the evaluation to ensure productive commentary. Identify the positives first, and keep a positive spin throughout the session. Open, honest, and productive evaluation should include an attack on the problem, not the people, and evaluators should be able to make a point, not an enemy. Exercises are time-consuming and labor-intensive, but the rewards are ample.
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