Medication Center Signage

Welcome to the Washington State Department of Health's Medication Center Resource site. Many of the materials on this site were developed with local partners and were designed to meet the needs of local health jurisdictions in our state.

The size and layout of your medication center(s) -- and the communication needs of your community -- will help determine the number of signs and specific messages you'll need. Please feel free to use these resources as a guideline and modify them, as necessary, to meet your organization's needs.

About this site

The signs and resources on these pages are intended for public health and emergency preparedness professionals. Members of the public are invited to visit our general information pages for personal preparedness resources and information.

POD or medication center?

In the event of an exercise or real emergency, public health may work with a variety of emergency preparedness partners to activate mass medication dispensing sites. Through user testing, we learned the term "Point of Dispensing" (POD) was not always clear to all partners or to the general public. We recommend the term "medication center" instead of POD and will use that term throughout this site.

Medication center information handouts

A template of a general information handout for use at local medication centers. We recommend local health jurisdictions download and customize this form in advance. Areas on the form that need to be completed by local planners are marked in red. The templates are designed with two handouts per 8-1/2 x 11 sheet.

Suggestion: Prepare a form template for each type of condition — anthrax, botulism, etc. — in advance, and develop an emergency system for rapid duplication.

Templates for this handout are also available in:

Russian (PDF format) (Word format)
Spanish (PDF format) (Word format)
Chinese (PDF format) (Word format)
Korean (PDF format) (Word format)
Vietnamese (PDF format) (Word format)

Sections

Signs

This section will familiarize you with the signs and hardware we recommend, and their specifications. It will help you find and download individual sign files, and provides a quick start guide to use while developing your signage plans. Also included is a catalog of all available signs.

Sign planning & tips

Planning ahead will help assure you are ready when you open a medication center. This includes assigning a signage coordinator; estimating costs; preparing resources in advance; creating a sample medication center layout; and determining other necessary supplies .

Ordering sign sets

How to order complete sets of medication center signs and/or hardware from the Washington State Department of Printing.

Additional resources

Additional resources from the Department of Health including a customizable handout for medication centers and fact sheets on several issues and medications.

Health Care Centers

Signage for emergency health care centers require many different signs. A site to help you plan for those centers can be found at our Health care Center signage site.

Questions

If you have questions about the signage site or would like further information, please contact signs@doh.wa.gov.

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Last Update : 03/21/2011 12:37 PM
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