Emergency Response Planning Tool

General practices play a significant role in the community’s response to an emergency. But, to be able to do this, your practice and its staff need to be prepared.

Completing the ERPT will give your practice a resource for all staff to refer in the case of a minor emergency or major disaster: who to call, how to store vaccines during power outages, bushfire emergency plans, pandemic response and much more.

Completing the ERPT takes around three hours. The critical information you enter into the ERPT is used to create an emergency response plan, which is individually tailored to your practice (see samples below).

How to register for the ERPT

1. Go to the URL: erpt.racgp.org.au/standardlogin
2. Click on Register your practice for the ERPT, in red. Complete the few details. Please tick the box where you agree to pay. This activates your plan so your practice can be allocated a funded licence. You will not be required to pay.
3. HealthpointANZ will contact you to arrange training and support

The ERPT helps you prioritise risks to the practice and how to prepare, respond and recover:

The ERPT guides practices through preparing for outages like power, water supply, systems and what to think about to mitigate downtime:

The cyber incident response has practical tips for staff members to follow if you have a data breach or someone internally makes a mistake:

A comprehensive pandemic section guides a practice through building their pandemic response plan:

The COVID Safety Plan module has been developed in collaboration with the RACGP and helps a practice build their own COVID safety plan.

The objectives of the module are to help protect the safety and wellbeing of all team members, patients, contractors and visitors. It recognises the need for specific precautions during the COVID-19 pandemic – these are outlined in detail in the COVID safety plan for your practice.

What is covered?

There is comprehensive pre-populated text on the following items, but the practice has the ability to embellish or add to:

• practice access and patient flow
• physical distancing
• infection control training
• use of PPE
• environmental cleaning and management
• record keeping
• practice team management and limiting interactions in closed spaces
• responding to a positive case or close contact in the practice team
• plan review
• public health unit contact numbers for all states.

Samples

Each participating general practice will receive:

• fully subsidised access to the ERPT in 2022 and 2023 (normally $385 per year)
• support from Healthpoint ANZ, including an initial set-up/orientation video call to help you complete an emergency response plan
• ongoing access to the Healthpoint ANZ help desk
• further support from your practice’s relationship manager at North Western Melbourne Primary Health Network as required.