Tandoc, A. O., III (2019). Iligtas sa tigdas ang 'Pinas: Laboratory surge capacity response to a massive nationwide measles outbreak in 2013-2014 (Unpublished master's thesis). Public Management Development Program, Development Academy of the Philippines.

Public Management and Development Program Senior Executive Class Batch 7 Thesis (SEC)--Development Academy of the Philippines.

This management case documents my experience as the head of the Department of Virology of the Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM), when a massive nationwide outbreak of Measles occured during the last quarter of 2013 to the whole of 2014. This was the largest infectious disease outbreak referred thus far to the Institute. with an unprecedented 40,000 blood specimens from all over the country recieved by the laboratory, overwhelming its testing capacity, and causing large backlogs. Our management response to the challenge of testing thousands of specimens given the limitations in number of staff and equipment, availability of supplies and reagents, further confounded by the urgent need to provide timely results to DOH and diesease reporting units, is described. The activation of a department-level Incident Command System was the most appropriate management approach to implement due to the urgency and scale of the surge of specimens. We decided as a team that the response to the specimen surge was the department's top priority and temporarily rearranged the organizational structure of the department in order to effectively coordinate the staff and allocate resources. The rapid transition from regular department and operations to department-wide ICS was not entirely smooth, meeting challenges at the start of and during implementation. The problems our unit encountered and the solutions were generated, the mistakes and lessons we learned, and the results of our efforts-whether we were successful or not-are discussed and analyzed using Operational Management framework. The relationship between surge and surge capacity is also discussed, and from this, a framework for improving surge response capability is proposed. Our ongoing efforts at improving the institute's public health resiliency are presented as part of the management's planned response to diseases with outbreak potential, which includes not just Measles, but also other emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases threats. It is my hope that the analysis and insights I shared through this management case would be useful to those who are working in the public sector -leaders, decision makers, and managers, including future scholars of the Development Academy of the Philippines Public Management Development Program-as a reference for improvements in operational effectivity and efficiency for the benefit of the public whom we all serve.