The 37 Southcoast employees, including 12 from Tobey Hospital, graduated from the 2011 Healthcare Leadership & Administrative Decision Making Course provided and fully funded by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security at the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Center for Domestic Preparedness (CDP). The employees completed the training at the Noble Army Hospital training facility in Anniston, Alabama.

“Health care response during a disaster is critical to the community’s overall response involving many agencies, departments and organizations on a local, state and federal level,” said Ray Price, Director of Safety & Security for Southcoast Hospitals Group. “The FEMA training adds a new dimension to our hospitals' disaster planning and response. The key is to have plans and procedures in place to respond quickly and effectively during the disaster situation.”

The Noble Army Hospital was converted in 1998 into a training site for health and medical education in terrorism, manmade and natural disasters. The National Training Facility (NTF) is the only hospital facility in the U.S. dedicated to training hospital and health care professionals in disaster preparedness and response. Attendees received advanced hands-on training by the country's top-leaders in disaster preparedness. The training enables participants to effectively prevent, respond to and recover from real-world incidents involving acts of terrorism and other hazardous events. The four-day training included two days of lectures and tabletop drills and two days of functional exercises that took place in a simulated hospital environment.

The scenarios incorporated in the drills included infant abduction, mass casualties, hazard chemical spill requiring decontamination of victims, bomb threat and pandemic response.