What's the Plan? Exploring the Bounds of a Health-Care Standard of Preparedness for Florida Hospitals: A Policy Analysis

Hurricane Katrina uncovered a potential new theory of liability for the health-care industry-failure to plan. Today, the issue remains unresolved: how does a hospital define its duty of preparedness? Research shows there are over 13 definitions for hospital preparedness, multiple types of risk, and arbitrary hospital assessment tools that are not based on empirical data. In the absence of a clear definition for health-care preparedness, this article proposes a "reasonable under the circumstances" test to evaluate alleged liability for failure to plan and similar claims of negligence. In addition, translational science is proposed to aid in the development of a health-care standard of preparedness through a 5-phase evidenced-based, multi-disciplinary process.