PeaceHealth is responding to Ebola in a coordinated way
In case you missed it, PeaceHealth released a suite of clinical training resources to help providers and caregivers identify and respond to a potential case of Ebola Virus Disease (EVD), should a patient contact us or present for care.
We would like to recognize the outstanding work of our infection control teams, nursing educators, CareConnect (formerly Epic) builders and educators, as well as our clinic managers and supervisors. They have put in countless hours of preparation. Thank you for all of your great work!
We were especially pleased to see that our policies and procedures are completely aligned with CDC ambulatory care guidelines released just last week.
The level of coordination that our response to EVD has required from our organization has been unprecedented. We have partnered with representatives from the CDC, along with officials from state and county governments.
This work also highlights the true benefit of being part of a system that is so focused on Mission and where we collaborate to come up with solutions that span the continuum.
For instance, there is now protocol for PeaceHealth Labs to safely transport and process specimens in a timely fashion. We have a response for provider questions about whether allowing a symptomatic patient to use the toilet is OK.
An Ethics Advisory has been published to aid providers who might ask if it is ethical to decline to offer treatments, such as CPR for a patient with advanced EVD.
We appreciate providers who have volunteered to care for patients suspected to have EVD, in the event there is a need. Any provider interested in volunteering should contact
Dr. Bob Pelz. It is important to note that volunteering to care for EVD patients will not negatively impact compensation. In other words, anyone on a form of production incentive would be held harmless for any "volunteer assignments."
Our response will continue to evolve; I am confident that we are ready for Ebola, the next highly communicable disease, or natural disaster that comes our way.
