ASHLAND — On Thursday, June 18, UH Samaritan Hospital Medical Center’s leadership held a press conference to answer reader-submitted questions from local news outlets, including Ashland Source.
For the past month, Ashland Source readers were prompted to submit any questions they had related to the COVID-19 pandemic for the local hospital’s leadership to answer.
Moderated by the hospital’s public information officer Kathy Witmer, a group of five panelists answered the reader-submitted questions on topics like hospital policy and practices, testing and local participation in clinical trials.
Panelists included president of UH Samaritan Medical Center Todd Harford, Chief Medical Officer Dr. Tim Kazprzak, Chief Nursing Officer Lisa Bushong, Quality and Risk Management Manager Jen Hageman and Manager of Emergency Preparedness Steve Carroll.
QUESTION: What are some of the ways UH has supported the mental and physical health of frontline workers?
ANSWER: “The support of our employees has always been a high priority for Samaritan Medical Center,” Harford said. “Even pre-COVID, we had resources for our employees if they needed any help.
“We have a ‘Healthy UH site,’ where we do promote exercise and wellness and dietary needs to be well, and we do innovate things in the community to engage not only our employees but people in the community.”
He discussed the Get Fit Challenge that took place earlier this year between UH Samaritan Medical Center and Ashland University employees.
Further, to keep information to employees as current as possible during the pandemic, the local hospital system created a website with tops for how to manage stress, links to human resource services and information on local childcare and food delivery options.
The leadership team at UH spoke with employees regularly, Harford said.
“It has been very stressful over the past three months, but I think we connected with them (employees) well. I think this is a major factor in helping them stay well,” he said.
He thanked the community for its role, too. Events like Chalk the Walk, where positive messages were written on the sidewalk outside the hospital entrance, and mask donations benefited the employees.
“It’s been a top priority and will continue to be a top priority,” Harford said.
QUESTION: Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, strategies by national, state and local officials were aimed at flattening the curve to avoid overwhelming hospital resources. Several questions from readers surrounded this topic of resources and care.
Specifically, a reader asked, what is the number of COVID-19 related hospitalizations Samaritan could have handled before capacity was reached and the hospital would have been considered overwhelmed?
ANSWER: “Each of the hospitals were asked to put together a plan to be able to increase our capacity by up to 300 percent. So for us, we were able to go up to 83 beds,” Bushong said.
She said the hospital also had stocked up on equipment and cross trained staff.
This plan was added to UH Samaritan Medical Center’s disaster plan and will remain part of the plan for the future.
QUESTION: If I require hospitalization for coronavirus, is Samarian equipped to take care of me? Will I be transferred to another hospital?
ANSWER: “We can take care of some of the most ill patients from COVID. We have very well trained staff, the highest level of medical expertise in our facility and the majority of patients — unless there’s another complication — will be able to stay with us,” Bushong said.
QUESTION: What’s the status of hospital visitation policies? If a patient is elderly or disabled, can someone accompany them? And when will UH ease restrictions?
ANSWER: “Currently in our emergency dept, we aren’t allowing any visitors unless there is a special circumstance, a pediatric patient, someone who cannot talk for themselves. Those types of special circumstances,” Bushong said.
On the in-patient units currently there are no visitors.
“We work with the families using virtual means so they can see their family members, they can communicate with them,” Bushong continued.
Only one visitor is allowed to accompany new moms in the OB unit.
“There’s some discussion of changes coming in the near future.. things are changing quickly,” Bushong said.
QUESTION: Is Samaritan concerned about a second wave of COVID-19? If so, how prepared are you?
ANSWER: “The short answer is we are very prepared for anything that might happen,” Harford said. “Ever since the beginning of march this team has been together every day planning with the community what our needs are, what our employees needs are, what our patients needs are. We are texting, emailing, calling each other every day.
“So I don’t know if there’s going to be a second wave, but I will tell you we will be prepared and we are prepared. We are in a constant state of preparedness.
The mission of the hospital system is to keep patients local.
“I believe we can handle any patient. It’s always been our motto at Samaritan Medical Center to treat locally as much as possible,” Harford continued.
QUESTION: The health department announced yesterday an outbreak in the Amish community, do you see that affecting Samaritan? And if so how?
ANSWER: “We work together with that community,” Harford said.
The hospital system and the Ashland County Health Department are in regular contact with the Amish community.
“So if there is a need for an influx of patients at samaritan medical center, we would be able to meet the needs of those patients,” he said.
QUESTION: Is it safe to go to the hospital and doctor’s office? What precautions are in place?
ANSWER: “If medical care is needed we definitely encourage you to make an appointment with your provider or if emergency care is needed, please come in to be seen and treated,” said Hageman, the quality and risk manager at the medical center.
She also served as a medical technical specialist in her incident command role.
The hospital is screening all visitors for fever and symptoms.
Wearing a mask during visits and hand washing before and after visits are recommended.
QUESTION: What’s the hospital’s stance on healthy people wearing masks? Why is UH requiring everyone to wear face masks?
ANSWER: “We are following the recommendations of the CDC and the Ohio department of health, and their recommendation is that masking helps prevent the spread of the virus,” Hageman said. “We know there are many individuals out and about who are without symptoms but are carrying the virus. And much like other viral disease processes, such as the flu, each person responds differently to the virus.
“So if you’re wearing a mask, you’re protecting other people. The mask is also going to protect you to some degree.”
QUESTION: What is being done to ensure adequate access to PPE?
ANSWER: “We have an adequate supply of PPE and additional resources to gather those if necessary,” Hageman said.
The cloth mask donations provided by the community aided in this.
QUESTION: Can you talk about telemedicine before, during and after COVID?
ANSWER: “Before covid we were very fortunate at Samatian to have a robust virtual hub,” Dr. Kaszprzak said.
Telehealth services were used in neurology, obstetrics, pulmonary, sleep, surgical and hepatology areas.
During the earlier shutdown, the local hospital system expanded these services to all primary care and specialists.
“There’s no going back,” he said about the future.
Telehealth will continue to be an option for patients into the future.
QUESTION: If a patient used telehealth for care during the COVID crisis, should they go back to in-person visits? Why or why not?
ANSWER: “That’s a discussion to have with your provider. A reason to go back would be to have a true physical exam,” Dr. Kaszprzak said.
QUESTION: What’s the clinical significance of antibody testing? How will the results be used?
ANSWER: “Antibodies reflect that your body has been exposed to the virus and has responded, but it doesn’t necessarily mean… you won’t get sick. We don’t know if you haven’t had symptoms. We’re still learning so much about the virus,” Dr. Kaszprzak said. “What we do know, again, is that antibodies reflect an exposure and a response by your body.”
The local hospital is partaking in larger research studies related to this. For example, local first responders may partake in a test for antibodies.
“The hypothesis is that because the first responders are in the community possibly dealing with ill patients… they may have exposure to it and thus have the antibody present,” said Carroll, manager for emergency preparedness and the planning officer for the incident command.
“I think we’re all waiting and very interested to see what the results of this particular study will be,” he continued.
QUESTION: What can you share about actual testing for coronavirus? Does Samaritan test locally? Are the tests sent elsewhere?
ANSWER: “Yes, Samaritan medical center is performing testing, specimen collection on individuals who have prescriptions for testing,” Hageman said.
These prescriptions come from the health department or primary care offices. Tests are also done prior to planned procedures.
Most tests are sent to the Cleveland Medical Center. The results come back within 12 to 18 hours.
Rapid testing is available at the local hospital, but is only used when certain criteria is met. Turnaround time for rapid testing is 50 to 60 minutes.
QUESTION: Is there an adequate amount of testing?
ANSWER: “At this time we do have adequate testing,” Hageman said. “Of course with the increased volume of testing as we open the state back up there is concern about this, but at this time, we have what we need to do the testing.”
QUESTION: How many tests does UH perform daily?
“The number daily does fluctuate depending primarily on the pre-admission testing that we do,” Hageman said. “We can go anywhere from 10 to 70 per day.”
QUESTION: How are the clinical trials proceeding at Samaritan? How many Samaritan patients have participated?
ANSWER: The local hospital had one patient participate in a trial. The hospital is eligible to participate in other trials, but patients have not been eligible to participate.
QUESTION: Did the pandemic affect your efforts to recruit new doctors?
ANSWER: “So as you can imagine during this time… we were very focused on caring for our patients and employees making sure they were safe, so we did have a small time frame of a couple weeks (where we didn’t recruit), then we did continue to recruit,” Harford said.
He went on to say the hospital has been successful in recruiting despite the pandemic.
