Rapid Assessment for Resilient Recovery and ... - GFDRR

o Patient medical records, including patients’ contact telephone numbers
and addresses, must be kept in a safe place and be easy to reproduce or
distribute to referral health facilities or mobile teams. Currently, medical
records are partly kept in an electronic database in almost public health
facilities and private hospitals. It is crucially important to establish standard
data interchange of essential data of patients e.g. drug allergy, clinical
history, treatments, drugs and important laboratory results. A backup
system for these medical records in well secure sites outside healthcare
facilities is recommended;
o Health literacy of chronic disease patients should be promoted. People who
live with chronic diseases have to understand appropriate self-care for
their chronic disease status, treatment plan, current treatments including
drugs, as well as make plans for potential disaster events. Healthcare staff
should also actively arrange consultations with chronic disease patients
prior to potential floods to discuss options of drug supplies and consultation
with medical personnel during the floods; and
o Health facilities should actively make plans on how to deliver needed
services during disaster events. It is possible for a health center to map the
locations of their own chronic disease patients, to ensure that health center
staff or village health volunteers can distribute drugs and visit patients in
case the patients cannot travel to the health center during the floods.
• Public and private hospitals in nearby areas should constitute a network and be
able to provide cross-support to each other in emergency situations.
• Safe location elements should be incorporated into new hospital and health center
construction and renovation. In flood-prone areas, hospitals and health centers
should be located on higher ground, and in cities/towns, should particularly be
higher than the street/roads in front of the hospitals and health centers.
o Health centers and clinics which are currently located below the street/road
level should be elevated to the street level or higher; and
o For hospitals that are located beside flood-prone rivers or canals, strong,
dam-like fencing could be built around the hospital to prevent flooding.
• Utilization of community-driven development mechanisms can be considered. The
types of damage can vary considerably between areas. Adopting a communitybased
approach can help match funding to diverse community needs and can
increase community ownership. If block grants are given to villages for reconstruction,
they can decide whether they should be used for repairing schools, revitalizing
farmland, or rebuilding a local health clinic. Community-based approaches can
also help ensure transparency of fund distribution, which is particularly important
when allocating contested private goods.
150 THAI FLOOD 2011 RAPID ASSESSMENT FOR RESILIENT RECOVERY AND RECONSTRUCTION PLANNING