Eric Cote launched Powered for Patients in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy to address lessons learned when six New York City-area hospitals suffered failures of their emergency power systems, leading to four emergency evacuations. Powered for Patients, which became a 501c3 non-profit in 2015, works to safeguard backup power and expedite power restoration for critical healthcare facilities by facilitating increased collaboration and information sharing between critical healthcare facilities, government and utilities.
Powered for Patients has received multiple rounds of federal funding, starting with initial funding provided in 2014 by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR). This funding supported the organization’s initial stakeholder meeting that brought together senior federal, state and local officials along with key private sector stakeholders for a foundational discussion to assess the state of emergency power resilience in U.S. hospitals. Subsequent funding from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security enabled the launch of a stakeholder engagement initiative with the Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency that culminated in the production of Protecting Patients When Disaster Strikes, a heralded Playbook on safeguarding emergency power and expediting power restoration.
In 2018, Powered for Patients was honored to have been selected by the Department of Homeland Security as one of ten innovative research and development programs as part of the DHS 2018 National Infrastructure Protection Plan (NIPP) Security & Resilience Challenge.
As part of its NIPP Security & Resilience Challenge project, Powered for Patients and its project partner Talus Analytics created the Power P.I.O.N.E.E.R. Dashboard Prototype, a powerful new tool that provides government officials and utilities with the first ever automated, real time warnings when emergency power is threatened at a critical healthcare facility during a power outage.
In 2019, the Los Angeles County Emergency Medical Services Agency executed a contract with Powered for Patients to lead a multi-phase emergency power resilience initiative focused on critical healthcare facilities that will span a four-year period.
The comprehensive Los Angeles County project will encompass an emergency power resilience assessment, development of new protocols to better safeguard emergency power and expedite prioritized power restoration, creation of a training component and ultimately development and coordination of exercises to test existing and new protocols.
Also in 2019, FEMA hired Eric Cote to develop a generic version of the Rhode Island Playbook, Protecting Patients When Disaster Strikes. This Emergency Power Resilience Toolkit will be a national resource for emergency managers, public health officials, healthcare facilities and utilities in launching local stakeholder engagement initiatives to help jurisdictions better safeguard emergency power.