MERT prepares response to mass casualty incident

On Sunday, 65 students lay wounded on Grays Ferry Avenue.

The Medical Emergency Response Team enlisted this group of volunteers for its annual Mass Casualty Incident simulation. Individuals from MERT, University of Pennsylvania Police Department, the Division of Public Safety, the Philadelphia Fire Department and AlliedBarton sharpened their crisis response skills by tending to the “injured” group of students.

This year’s simulation modeled a bombing and a secondary active shooter emergency. MCI topics are chosen by MERT on a year by year basis and generally align with current events.

“I was looking in the news for things that I had seen recently,” MCI simulation coordinator and College junior Victoria Pereira said.

This year’s event was inspired by the Boston Marathon bombing and a recent school shooting in Marysville, Washington.

Although Penn has never experienced such an extreme state of emergency, MCI-specific response can be applied to more commonplace events. MERT approaches Spring Fling, for instance, in much of the same way it might approach an MCI.

“During Spring Fling, we kind of operate under a mass casualty system. At the concert, for instance, we have a treatment area where we bring a lot of patients so we don’t have to send them to the hospital,” Pereira said. “So we do use these skills for Spring Fling because we have a high call volume.”

The MCI simulation is essentially about preparedness.

“You never know what can happen,” Pereria added. “Because we are emergency professionals, we want to be prepared for everything. If anything would happen like this, we are here and ready to respond.”

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