How GIS is supporting NHS Emergency Planning in the South West

1. Trevor Foster
GIS Manager
NHS South West Commissioning Support
How GIS is supporting NHS Emergency Planning
in the South West

2. HealthGIS Maps
• How GIS supports NHS Emergency Planning in the South
West, particularly the flooding on the Somerset levels during
the winter
• HealthGIS on-line mapping portal development, using
Cadcorp Web Map Layers

3. SWCS - GIS and Mapping Service
• Formerly Avon IM&T Consortium - moved to South West
CSU in April 2013
• Supporting NHS; Avon Health Authority – Primary Care
Trusts – Clinical Commissioning Groups since 1995
• Ordnance Survey OpenData & PSMA (2010/11)
• Ordnance Survey Licensed Partner – May 2014
• Growth in demand from wider NHS
• Developed team of GIS analysts/developers
• Development of HealthGIS Maps (on-line mapping portal)

4. Customers
• Bristol, North Somerset, South Glos, Somerset CCGs
• NHS England Area Team (Bristol, North Somerset, Somerset,
South Gloucestershire)
• Other Area Teams – East Anglia (Serco), Shropshire & Staffs
• Strategic Clinical Network (SW) – formerly Avon, Somerset, Wilts +
Peninsula, Dorset, 3 Counties (Glos) cancer networks
• Public Health depts in Local Authorities – Avon, Wiltshire, Dorset
• Mental Health Trust (NW London)
• Community Health – Bristol, North Somerset, South
Gloucestershire, Sirona Care & Health (Bath)
• Primary Care Commissioning (PCC)
• Ad-hocs; Hospital Trusts, BBC Children in Need, NHS Scotland

5. HealthGIS maps –
online portal
• First version developed in 2010 -
still in use
• Cadcorp GeognoSIS, Web Map
Viewer
– Requires component
installations and
configuration on client PC
• New Cadcorp environment
released in 2013; Web Map
Layers
– No component installation
– Any browser
– Faster and easier to use

6. HealthGIS maps – online portal
• Business case; the cost of the Web Map layers software
would be less than cost of IT support for community users
• Web Map Layers implemented end 2013, administrator
training January 2014
• Plan to migrate existing projects during 2014
• An initial candidate for migration – “Emergency Planning”
project
• Initial development in January and then “tried it out” on
the Emergency Planning Team. They found it so useful to
support work around Somerset levels flooding, they’ve
been using it since

7. Supporting Emergency Planning
“The SWCSUs HealthGIS system was an invaluable element of
the NHS response to the Somerset Floods providing a simple but
efficient means of identifying flooded and at risk areas and cross
checking these with vulnerable patients and health assets”
Simon Steele
NHS England Emergency Planning Team

8. Inter-agency collaboration
• Within the Tactical Coordinating Group (Blue-light
services, LA, NHS, Environment Agency, Red Cross,
Military)
• Maps of at risk postcodes shared (GPs, Somerset
Community Partnership, A&E Hospital) as we were the
first to produce the information
• Also identified other agency assets (e.g. electricity sub
stations in these areas)
• Able to share data with other agencies in a visual, easy to
understand format

9. Demonstrate example scenarios
1. Identify and evacuate ‘at risk’ properties
2. Water mains failure – search for potentially affected
health assets; GP surgeries, Care Homes, Minor Injuries
Unit
http://nww.healthgis.nhs.uk/
http://nww.healthgis.nhs.uk/wmlmaps/EmergencyPlanning/

10. • HealthGIS welcome page
• Open project “Emergency
Planning”
HealthGIS online mapping portal

11. • Alerts provided by
Environment Agency
• Search for
Postcode/address *
• Search by
placename, service
site name
Properties at risk of flooding

12. • Zoom to location
• About this location *
• Configured for chosen
areas:
• NHS areas; CCG, Area
Team, GP practice
• Experian Mosaic group
and type – “provides
an understanding of
the types of
property/people”
Properties at risk of flooding

13. • Map Layers
• Environment Agency
Flood Zone 3 (WMS)
• Layer Information *
(metadata)
Properties at risk of flooding

14. • Somerset flooding
February 2014 (from
OpenStreetMap)
Properties at risk of flooding

15. • Zoom to location (large
scale)
• Properties/postcodes
cross-referenced with
other NHS agencies
(GPs, community health)
• Identify vulnerable
population or patients
with healthcare needs
Properties at risk of flooding

16. • Additional reference
layers
• Experian Mosaic
Properties at risk of flooding

17. • Map Feature
Information
• Group D “Successful
professionals living in
suburban or semi-rural
homes”
Properties at risk of flooding

18. • Additional reference
layers
• Experian Mosaic
• Map feature
information
• Group M “Elderly
people reliant on state
support”
Properties at risk of flooding
~500m

19. • Additional reference
layers
• Postcode polygons
• Greyscale basemap
Properties at risk of flooding

20. • Additional reference
layers
• Census (Output Area)
population statistics
• AddressBase property
information, incl.
property type, UPRN
Properties at risk of flooding

21. • Electricity sub-station
• NHS team notified
Western Power
• New layer from
AddressBase, filtered
by class “CU01”
Properties at risk of flooding

22. Results/Outcomes from NHS Emergency Planning Team
“patients requiring chemotherapy who needed boat transport to get
them to hospital”
“a patient who required an electrical hoist in an area at risk of power
cuts, which required a generator to be delivered”
“the system even worked on a 3G connection using a mobile phone as
a hotspot connection”

23. • Risks of losing water
supply, further flooding
• All healthcare services
layers
• ‘eyeballing’ revealed
assets at risk included;
GP surgeries, Care
Homes, a Minor Injuries
Unit
Risk of Water Mains Failure

24. • Langport area
• Contact details
information
Risk of Water Mains Failure

25. • Query map objects
• Spatial and attribute
queries
• Electricity sub-stations
in flood area
• Export to CSV file
Risk of Water Mains Failure

26. • Annotate the map
• Draw polygon and text
• Print map
• Print to PDF service
Risk of Water Mains Failure

27. • Layered PDF
• Legend
• Scale bar

28. Future Development
• Expanding the project for other scenarios (e.g. traffic accidents,
pollution, pandemic disease, UXB…)
– Emergency Treatment Centres
– Accessibility to all Hospitals (drive-time and blue-light travel times)
– Locations of Mass Casualty Vehicles
– Locations of Emergency Dressing Packs
– Motorway junctions, other possible evacuation sites
– Pandemic Flu Prophylaxis Centres (including using GIS analysis to
identify optimum locations)
– Key infrastructure (e.g. Hinkley Point nuclear power station)
– Mental Health inpatient facilities
• Add layer of patient locations (with appropriate security) for
immediate access to relevant patient information in impacted
areas, e.g. “Vulnerable people”

29. • Further information?
• Contact us at trevor.foster@swcsu.nhs.uk
or GIS.Team@swcsu.nhs.uk
Telephone: 0117 9002490
• Visit our website:
http://www.healthgis.nhs.uk
http://nww.healthgis.nhs.uk (NHS staff only)