Hospitals are one of the critical facilities for any country.They play most important role in saving lives after disasters. They have an increased social and political value for an affected community too, and as such, special attention must be given to reducing their vulnerabilities to disasters. Almost all hospitals in Iran are located in areas at high risk for disasters, mainly earthquakes; would they continue to function in emergency situations? One of the best tools may answer the question is “Paho Hospital Safety Index” which helps health facilities assess their safety. The tool has a checklist (145 items), a guideline and a formulated calculator, calculates hospitals safety scores and levels. The tool is developed for hospitals located in Latin America and the Caribbean. To use this tool in different situation for instance in Iran, maybe we need to do some changes in the checklist, weights and calculator. In this study, at first vulnerability in 3 hospitals was assessed, using the original Paho tool. Then the checklist reviewed by three university faculties and four disaster experts, and Using Delphi method, they placed checklist’s items into three categories (no need to change, change is better, changeis necessary), as a next step, the group made the necessary changes in only the items was felt into category 3, then reformulate the calculator for changed areas and items. The assessments refreshed and safety indexes recalculated, using the adapted checklist and calculator. A Comparison between the results indicates the difference between the scores calculated by the original tooland the adapted tool isn’t significant (max difference= 4%). In conclusion, the hospital safety index could adapt for use in our country with minimum changes. Therefore, hospitals in Iran can use the tool to monitor their safety levels, and then make better mitigation and preparedness plans.
