University Hospital prepared for mass casualty incident

Sunday night’s shooting massacre at a country concert in Las Vegas sent thousands of people scrambling for safety and sent nearly 500 to the hospital.

The Las Vegas Police Department said Wednesday night out of 489 people injured, 172 were still in the hospital.

“The fortunate thing about these large scale incidents is when you hear there’s hundreds of people that are injured, most of those are probably minor injuries,” said University of Missouri Hospital trauma surgeon Jeff Coughenour.

University Hospital is one of four American College of Surgeons (ACS)-verified Level I trauma centers in the state and is the only Level I trauma center in mid-Missouri, meaning the hospital has the resources to treat all types of injuries.

Coughenour said the hospital has a plan in place in the event of a mass casualty incident. He said the hospital adjusted its plan outlining specific job functions for staff members after the Orlando nightclub shooting. He said they practice certain parts of the plan throughout the year.

“Probably one of the most important things I can do in a mass casualty incident is actually lock the hospital down and only let those patients who need our immediate service in,” he said. “We can later sort out the more minor injuries later so we don’t overwhelm our resources for the patients who truly need it.”

Those with less serious injuries could be treated at Women’s and Children’s Hospital, the VA Hospital or Boone Hospital Center, said Coughenour.

“We don’t have the luxury like some of the bigger cities of having other trauma centers,” he said. “But I think that probably underscores the importance of routing the patients to the correct destinations from the scene.”