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Safer Institute has designed and built software that is currently being implemented as an identity ecosystem for the State's Emergency Response Officials (S/EROs) and First Responders. The IMRI Program has been designed in line with best practices recommended by the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
IMRI engages and enrolls sponsored S/EROs and First Responders for issuance of an IMRI smartcard. The IMRI system will enable incident commanders, access control entities and authorities having jurisdiction with a trusted form of identity verification, linked to an attribute verification data base thereby ensuring identity, capabilities and access authorization. The system will be Rhode Island centric, apply to Rhode Island's first responders and emergency response officials, but also interoperable with federal systems and agencies, such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Once engaged, the IMRI system will be used in aiding deployment of resources to regional partners by ensuring capabilities and identity with the Emergency Management Assistance Compact (EMAC) and MOU communities.
The size and complexity of the IMRI system involves a robust statewide data management system, and an aggregator to gather and verify trainings, licenses and certifications with an easy to use card holder interface for updating and viewing attributes with a password, PIN and biometric entry process. While the IMRI system is a Rhode Island initiative, it is directly linked to work conducted through DHS's Technology Transition Working Group (TTWG) and other US states rolling out similar programs. It will provide a basis for other New England States to replicate.
Working closely with the Rhode Island Disaster Medical Assistance Team (RI DMAT), Safer Institute supports a comprehensive volunteer management system for the RI Department of Health. The Emergency System for the Advance Registration of Volunteer Health Professional (ESAR-VHP) is a federal program that is a foundational component of RI Responds.
During 2008, The State of Rhode Island fully launched its statewide, overarching web-based volunteer system known as Rhode Island Responds. Under this system, the State's ESAR-VHP program, renamed SERV-RI, the sole Rhode Island Medical Reserve Corp Unit known as RI MRC and RI DMAT partnered with the Rhode Island Department of Health to create a statewide web-based system to offer a centralized credentialing and activation portal that allows the integration of the three volunteer health groups under one umbrella. While the entities maintain their own identity and core goals, RI Responds offers the Rhode Island Department of Health and Local Emergency Managers in the state a one-stop shop of resources available to them in terms of medical health professionals. The system offers medical health professionals numerous and appropriate volunteer opportunities based on their skills, time commitment, and interest.
In August 2009, the RI Department of Health requested that the RI Responds system actively participate in the response to the H1N1 Pandemic in Rhode Island. It was a first for the ESAR-VHP program nationwide. The RI Department of Health had comprised a statewide school-based vaccination model and requested that the RI Responds system, under the management of the RI MRC, recruit, train and activate willing and able medical and non-medical to provide the staffing for the H1N1 clinics to be held in every school in Rhode Island over a 28-day period. Simultaneous clinics were activated on a statewide basis utilizing multiple medical and non-medical trained averaging 17 clinics a day. Safer Institute's role coordinating the RI Responds system's actual utilization of credentialed volunteer health professionals with RI MRC has been recognized by the State and Federal Government as a first of its kind successful statewide use of ESAR-VHP.
There are currently more than 3,000 medical registered in the system. Contact, credential and certification information for the above-referenced is contained within the overarching RI Responds system and each of the above is credentialed according to the ESAR-VHP requirements based on the information provided.
The ESAR-VHP program is a State-based approach to establishing a national system. Every State independently develops, maintains, operates, and commands an ESAR-VHP System. This effort is being funded through a federal grant: The National Bioterrorism Hospital Preparedness Program. This system for mutual assistance is utilized as a national asset, which supports common definitions, standards, and protocols. In this way, the States' ESAR-VHP Systems form a critical network to facilitate the deployment of willing, needed, and qualified health for any emergency.
NH Respond's ESAR-VHP System was created in accordance with formal incident command and emergency protocols with proper authorities responsible for the coordination of health . It adheres to the ESAR-VHP guidelines, permitting identification and pre-qualification of volunteer healthcare providers who are licensed in New Hampshire in advance of a large-scale disaster or public health emergency.
NH Responds was built to provide the State with a centralized clearing house for all volunteer health professionals in the State of New Hampshire while meeting all of the ESAR-VHP guidelines and offering a fully integrated system that is capable of credentialing those to all four ESAR-VHP levels within minutes, based on the information provided. In addition to the web-based registration, NH Responds provides State and team administrators a tool in the management and activation of . The system is capable of creating training events, tracking events, creating reports and notifying based on a myriad of attributes.
The New Hampshire Responds is a system built on three portals, which recruit and credential medical and non-medical for NH ESAR-VHP, NH Medical Reserve Corps and The Disaster Behavioral Health Response Team (DBHRT). The system provides the NH State Administrators the tools necessary to work through the systems and improve the way their team signs up , verifies their credentials and activates them.
Our special needs project is an integration project between a custom built application and our notification system. This process allows people to register in a central location while giving state and local emergency response officials the ability to send targeted messages by disability and location.
The notification system gives the individuals who require assistance the ability to better adapt to emergency situations. The system consumes data from the Special Needs registry and allows the local EMA directors to send out messages (Voice, Email and SMS) to their local population through a web-based system. We are currently working to enhance the system to work with a GIS interface. Safer Institute offers needs based registries and notification systems to all clients from state government to small businesses.
The Ocean State Higher Education Economic Development and Administrative Network (OSHEAN) received grant funding to build a state of the art fiber network within the State of Rhode Island. Due to the complexity and amount of money being invested into the network by the federal government, OSHEAN is required to keep accurate inventory control of all hardware purchases. OSHEAN contracted Safer Institute in 2010 to design and implement an accountability system linked to inventory management software. The inventory management system allows OSHEAN to track more than 50 locations thousands of inventoried items. The locations are predominately located within Rhode Island and are typically datacenters with a predictable layout. OSHEAN will host all servers required for the RFID service-function. Safer Institute was requested to use a combination of bar codes and RFID software to provide OSHEAN the capability to manage its inventory of network resources.
Safer has combined the best in breed Active RFID technology with its custom algorithms to manage, take action on, and integrate Inventory Control with RFID. The system designed for OSHEAN was based on one Safer currently uses to track Portable Ventilators that will be used during a virulent pandemic situation for the State of Rhode Island.
