A gastric bypass patient is on the table in the operating room when an electrified surgical tool ignites a dry sponge. The fire is seemingly extinguished, and the sponge is tossed in the trash. But the fire wasn't out. Now the trash is engulfed in flames.

That was the scenario Tobey Hospital's operating room staff members had to deal with during an emergency preparedness fire drill on Friday, July 13.

The goal was both for the staff to practice the procedure for getting patients out safely during an emergency, and for Southcoast Health System directors to discover ways they can fine-tune their safety plans.

The doctors and nurses had a litany of things to worry about once the "fire" started.

Who do you need to alert? How do you keep the patient safe in transport? What is the procedure if you're operating in a room next to the one with the fire?

Even a short delay in making snap decisions could make a big difference because, as Deborah Rideout, RN, explained: a fire doubles in size every minute.

And then there were the unforeseen issues. The fire alarm didn't sound immediately because it wasn't pulled hard enough. The intercom couldn't be heard very well in the operating rooms.

But despite the ominous date (Friday the 13th!), officials said the drill was a success.

"They had patients out within a minute," said Rideout, who serves as Southcoast Hospitals Groups' Director of Perioperative Services. (The "patients" for the drill are no strangers to the operating room — they were actually staff!)

In a debriefing after the drill, the operating room staff members — noting that they all behaved in high school — said they were particularly surprised at the amount of force one needs to use when pulling a fire alarm.

Staffers also discovered a number of things that one otherwise wouldn't normally think about — like what needs to be unplugged quickly before a hospital bed can be moved, and

Rideout said the hands-on approach to the drill makes a big difference in an emergency.

"You take away more" from the drill, she said, adding: "I hope they never need to use the lessons from today, ... but if it does happen, it's a little less foreign."

Wareham Fire Department Captain Mike Dykas echoed Rideout's sentiment, and added: "I was impressed with how fast they had people out. ... All in all, everything went very, very well."

The Tobey Hospital fire drill was one in a series of drills that took place at each of the Southcoast hospitals. And it's just one in a myriad of emergencies — from chemical spills to hurricanes and floods — for which the hospitals prepare.

The goal of the various drills is "to train, to know, to have a system that works," said David Camara, Southcoast Health System Associate Safety Officer and Emergency Manager. The drills "point out all the areas of improvement."

Ray Price, Southcoast Health System Director of Safety and Security, said that staff will now update its emergency plans based on what the drill revealed.