The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has altered how health care is provided in the United States and has significantly affected how healthcare facilities operate daily. Fasciitis across the nation is seeing a rise in patients seeking treatment for a respiratory condition that may be COVID-19. They are also experiencing postponed and delayed non-COVID-19 care, supply chain disturbances, increases in hospitals’ occupancy, staff absenteeism due to illness or caregiving responsibilities, and increases in mental health issues. Two vaccines are currently approved and recommended for the avoidance of the novel coronavirus.
Healthcare facilities need to be prepared to provide patients and healthcare professionals with care for people in the safest manner possible. This preparation is pertinent whether patients require home-based care, long-term care, emergency treatment, urgent care, hospital services, or a traditional hospital stay. In this article, we will discuss the ways healthcare facilities can operate effectively during the pandemic and adjust their delivery methods to accommodate people who are stuck in lockdown.
The Benefits of Implementing Telehealth Services
Healthcare providers must alter their traditional approaches to providing healthcare services during the COVID-19 pandemic to reduce the need for in-person care. The reality of this is the use of telehealth and other digital health systems. These practices will significantly help mitigate patient and healthcare professionals’ risk of catching the virus and passing it on to others. Patients who are older, unable to travel, have limited mobility, or live in a rural area can benefit from offering telehealth services.
Telehealth services are an ideal solution for the patient screening process. Instead of having people come into a physical location for minor conditions or ailments, a preliminary phone call to discuss symptoms can prevent an office visit altogether. Video calls can also be utilized if a physical inspection of the patient is required. This strategy will dramatically reduce the spread of COVID-19. It is also an effective way to help patients identify whether their symptoms might be a sign of COVID-19 and if they need to take further action or visit a hospital. This strategy can be utilized for all other ailments and higher acuity care needs.
Using telehealth services is a great way for primary health care providers and health care specialists to stay in touch with their patients. This service is important for behavioral and mental health providers as well as patients who suffer from chronic conditions. Therapy sessions (individual or group) can be conducted over the phone or on a video call without exposing patients or doctors to the coronavirus. Telehealth can also be an excellent method for managing patient medications and prescriptions.
Managing Mildly Ill COVID-19 Patients Remotely
If you are a primary care provider with mildly ill patients suffering from COVID-19, the best course of action is to treat their symptoms from home. During these trying times, it falls to healthcare providers to go above and beyond to help patients remotely. This effort includes assessing a patient’s ability to self-isolate and their risk of spreading the virus to others in the home. It is essential to provide as much precise information to your patients as possible, whether custom-made information materials or guidance to the CDC website for best practices and safety tips. All patients with COVID-19 need to know when to abandon self-care and seek our in-person care or emergency services.
One above-and-beyond procedure your healthcare facility can implement is the regular monitoring of patients remotely. Assigning a qualified staff member to do regular check-ins using the phone, texts, emails, website portals, or video conferencing will go a long way in caring for your patients. If available, encourage patients to take advantage of local public health resources or community organizations. Consider patient factors such as age or disability and help coordinate services such as medication, grocery, and meal delivery to help patients isolate at home.
Focus on Source Control
No matter the type of healthcare facility, it is essential that healthcare professionals focus on source control to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. Source control is referred to by the Center for Disease Control (CDC) as “the use of masks to cover a person’s mouth and nose and help reduce the spread of large respiratory droplets to others when the person talks, sneezes, or coughs. This masking can help reduce the spread of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, by someone who is infected but does not know it.” Simply put, source control protects other people.
This is an essential distinction from respiratory protection, which protects the wearer. According to the CDC, respiratory protection refers to respirators, which are protective devices that cover a person’s nose and mouth or the entire face or head to help reduce the wearer’s exposure from breathing in air that contains contaminants, such as small respiratory droplets from a person who has COVID-19. This type of protection can include filtering face piece respirators (FFRs), like N95 respirators. In other words, because of the limited supplies, proper respiratory protection should be reserved for frontline workers and first responders who rely on it to perform their work safely.
All healthcare providers must use all possible source control methods for people entering their facilities to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Patients and visitors must be required to wear a mask while inside your facility at all times. Make masks available for people who failed to bring one of their own. Posting signs on the outside of the building and in the main congregation areas puts the patient’s ownness and makes enforcing the rules much more straightforward.
Signs and visual alerts that display best practices and respiratory hygiene should be displayed prominently throughout the facility. Patients and caregivers should maintain a physical distance of 6 feet or more at all times. Visitation of patients should be limited to only essential to the patient’s recovery.
Implementing these practices can dramatically reduce the spread of COVID-19 and keep your patients and staff safe.
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