What is LIP? It’s an acronym for Life Safety, Incident Stabilization and Property Protection – and those three areas – in that order are the top-line Priorities or Objective Categories of any incident response operation. They must always occur, and be prioritized in that order when it comes to creating Strategies and Tactics on the Operation. When you are considering a Mission Assignment, ask yourself: Does it fit this criteria? Are we making sure our team is safe at all times? Remember Responder Life Safety is always the number 1 priority.
And for our healthcare professional folks – our “LIP” is different from the LIP you may be familiar with: Licensed Independent Practitioners.
– Joint Commission Hospital Accreditation
LIP has aspects for every event, incident, disaster, etc. It’s a great way to prioritize what everyone should do – for both emergency/first responders and those who are residents/workers at the site!
If you are evacuating a building, even for a fire drill, your priorities should be to get your self out, help others if you can, close the door behind you on your way out and let your supervisor (or emergency team member) know you safely exited the building. Worry about the paperwork, personal items, etc. later.
hi i run a operating room and during a life safety inspection and inspector asked me for our LIP protocol. i asked what it was and he stated it is the protocol we would follow if there is a fire in the Operating room it self.
is LIP the correct terminology or is it a term used for any life safety event?
Hi Laura – Thank you very much for the question! I had not heard of a “LIP Protocol” before, and I believe in the hospital world, it’s probably more an acronym for “Licensed Independent Practitioner”. The Joint Commission has a number of various templates and standards for life safety in the operating room (lots of differences as to what to do for a fire or active assailant – than for say a school or a warehouse). I consulted a colleague of mine, Dave Bujak, CEM – who has worked in a number of hospitals in New York and Ohio. He noted that in the hospitals he worked at, the operating rooms had specific fire plans – with staff and LIPs having specific roles:
– The Operating Room is a unique place because of the use of oxygen and heat-generating (cauterizing) instruments in the same immediate area.
– He recalls anecdotally, that the procedures involved immediate gas shutoff, smothering of flames with blankets and potential use of sterile water. Most OR fires can be extinguished within seconds if the team knows their roles and moved quickly.
– He believes the staff Fire Safety team conducted OR fire drills regularly with the Department of Surgery personnel.
Dave Bujak, CEM
https://www.linkedin.com/in/dave-bujak
Hope this helps! Your note also will also generate an edit to this post from me, so we (hopefully) don’t confuse our healthcare readers anymore!
Michael Prasad, MA, CEM
Senior Research Analyst
Barton Dunant.