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in Culpeper. The Gordonsville resident works with the Jefferson Area Board for the Aging through the University of Virginia School of Nursing.
“I think it could make the difference between surviving a huge event or not,” she said of the network. “If we have a skilled volunteer core, then it’s better for everyone.”
Higgins has experienced medical emergencies before. Several years ago, she helped isolate an outbreak of foodborne illness that affected more than 100 people in a weekend. The health department’s quick and coordinated actions identified the source and contained the situation in less than a week.
Training was the key, according to the nurse practitioner.
“Especially if it’s consistent across the board,” Higgins said. “Everyone needs to communicate the same way.”
But healthcare professionals can only stretch so far. If the area experienced an outbreak of smallpox — considered a “worst case” scenario — health department officials estimate that hundreds of volunteers could be needed to man various dispensing units, where residents would be inoculated to protect them from the outbreak.
And not only would experienced doctors and nurses be needed, but a wide variety of tasks would he waiting for those not trained in healthcare professions.
“We need someone to simply keep people calm,” local volunteer coordinator Claudia Vento said. “There are administrative roles that need to be filled, paperwork that needs to be done and a lot of other things. We’d need someone to direct traffic, handle parking, push wheelchairs, watch over young children while their parents were treated, interpreters, get food for other volunteers and on, and on.
“There would be a lot of roles people could play in an operation of this magnitude,” Vento continued. “And we need to have trained people in place that would know their roles, be familiar with the process and ready to act quickly.”
The regional unit of the Medical Reserve Corps holds
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