Case Study: Louisiana Department of Health improves hurricane hospital evacuation planning with Palisade @RISK

Louisiana Department of Health Uses @RISK to Prepare Hospitals for a Hurricane Strike

The Louisiana Department of Health (LDH) faced the complex challenge of planning and justifying the emergency evacuation of entire hospitals ahead of a major hurricane. To secure federal support and military resources, LDH needed to model thousands of variables and provide realistic ranges for patient numbers and resource requests. They partnered with Palisade, using its @RISK risk analysis software, to build a sophisticated model for this purpose.

Palisade’s Custom Development team built a user-friendly, customized @RISK model for LDH. This solution allowed the department to easily configure and run multiple evacuation scenarios, incorporating numerous uncertainties. The model provided clear, probabilistic outputs and compelling graphics to justify resource requests to federal partners. As a result, LDH successfully used the Palisade @RISK model to optimize its evacuation plans and secure the necessary federal support, including a major change in how critical care patients are transported.

Louisiana Department of Health

Henry Yennie

Program Manager