Physician Redeployment During COVID-19 Surges 2021 Disaster Planning for California Hospitals Virtual Conference
Between March 2020 and March 2021, Northern California
experienced three COVID-19 surges, each one sequentially larger
than the last. Each of these surges had the potential to strain
traditional physician staffing, and so a centralized physician
redeployment program was developed across the 21 medical centers
of Kaiser Permanente Northern California to address potential
shortages. The program developed and refined a number of
redeployment strategies, including leveraging the
interconnectedness of physicians within the KP Northern
California health care system. This presentation focuses on the
strategies used to redeploy physicians, as well as the training
and mental health support provided by the program.
