Resilient Health Infrastructure: strengthening hospitals’ capacity to respond effectively during disasters and crises

Abstract

Resilient Health Infrastructure (RHI) is part of MERCY Malaysia’s Building Resilient Communities (BRC) initiative. It is a program focusing on advocating a planned preparation in strengthening hospitals’ in order to respond effectively during disasters as well as fast recovery from the impact of extreme events. Hospital management and its built environment representing building and infrastructure systems within a defined boundary should perform in a predictable manner during and after a hazard event and/or disaster. The failure of hospitals to absorb and accommodate pressures during disasters will cause performance degradation of services and health care of the hospital. This paper will discuss strategic approaches taken to increase the level of resiliency for health infrastructure, with focus on the criteria of robustness, redundancy and rapidity. The study of this paper will share the RHI/BRC initiatives in the investigation of health infrastructure’s (i) robustness through building codes and structure, architecture, planning and zoning; (ii) redundancy through planning and operations; and (iii) rapidity through communication, movement and risk assessment. The case studies conducted in partnership with the Kelantan State Health Department in Malaysia. This study will form a clear understanding of hospital resilience, and help in the understanding of drafting preliminary conceptual framework for a more resilient health infrastructure.