Surge Operations Call Center: Managing Capacity Through Innovation and Collaboration

On 26 March 2020, the three adult healthcare systems in Central Ohio received a call to action requesting that they develop a process to manage the surge of patient volumes related to the COVID-19 pandemic. A conference call with the Central Ohio Trauma System (COTS) Team and hospital leadership occurred that afternoon. The teams collaborated and coordinated with all key stakeholders to develop the Surge Operations Call Center (SOCC), which was activated on 8 April 2020. The initial goal was to monitor the COVID-19 patient population in the Central Ohio area and the overall census capacity in each hospital.

SOCC’s goal was to direct patients to hospitals with available beds and staff to avoid overloading individual hospitals. If one hospital reached capacity, the SOCC would evaluate census across the region and direct patients to the closest most appropriate hospital with capacity.