For all of you in the medical field serving the public and your patients, how is the current infection level among medical workers and staff these days? Both statistically (if anyone knows) and anecdotally.

I know there have been many lives lost unfortunately due to trying to keep the rest of us alive and there were probably more ill and lost early than whatever it is currently. But what are you seeing now and how safe do you think medical workers and hospitals are with the current protocols?

I ask this for a couple of reasons.

I hate to think so many people trying to do good might be living with the kind of fear we saw for medical workers early on in Italy, NY etc. and hope confidence has been gained on the front line.

Second, I have a daughter headed to the Baylor hospital today to have my first grandchild while my wife is pulling her 6th in 11 days every-other-day 24 hour shift with her ALS afflicted mother in ICU at UT Southwestern. As you all know, I can't be there to support either of them due to the situation. It is tough on us with the restrictions and family members in the hospital and I hope this changes for other families in the future.

not a doctor...but who really knows right now. However, regarding the 28 year old medical student that recently died in Houston this week...I would suspect a major factor in her case was the "viral load" she possibly contracted while caring for COVID patients.

And to answer your question more thoroughly, a lot was learned during the initial surge in New York. Policies regarding resuscitation, intubation, and isolation were all adjusted in the several weeks they were experiencing crisis.

By the time the virus really hit Texas hard we had PPE available and intubation/resuscitation strategies in place to minimize staff exposure.

How often are medical staff tested?

My wife is a home health physical therapist and there has been an effort to not have them get tested because of the fear of staffing issues.

They have to go to find testing on their own. My SIL is a physician in NYC and they were doing similar things.

plain_o_llama said:

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How often are medical staff tested?

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At our facility it is when symptomatic or when there is a known exposure outside of work. We prescreen for symptoms before coming to work. No random or scheduled testing for staff outside of those criteria. No isolation or quarantine for exposure at work. If the coworker you sat next to at the nurses' station the entire shift turns up positive, no test and no quarantine for you so long as you don't have symptoms. Unlikely you would even be notified of exposure. They justify it by mandating mask wearing and eye protection at all times (although many of us have been forgoing face shields) and assume you are protected.

If we have a substantial contact with a positive case outside of work, we are to get notify the employee health department, get tested and self-isolate until the test is resulted. If negative, right back to work but closely monitor symptoms.

And IMO this has worked just fine. Given what we know about how PCR testing can pick up non-infectious viral fragments and how taxing quarantine would be on the healthcare system in terms of staffing, this approach is probably best.

Moxley said:

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And IMO this has worked just fine. Given what we know about how PCR testing can pick up non-infectious viral fragments and how taxing quarantine would be on the healthcare system in terms of staffing, this approach is probably best.

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That last part is why I was asking. If a person can shed live virus or virus fragments as measured by PCR testing couldn't nearby people "inhale" live virus and/or virus fragments? We assume they acquire the former. Why not the latter?

The point being might a positive PCR test not even signal a prior infection? The counter argument to this would be people working in an environment with considerable exposure would test positive fairly often. And why haven't we seen this? An ER or Covid ward would be the perfect testbed. YMMV :-)

I run an outpatient physical therapy clinic in Round Rock treating 70-80 patients a day. We have 13 employees and have not shut down for a single day since this began. We have had 0 (NO) cases from our staff or our patients since the end of February (knock on wood). We screen all patients for temperature and travel history beforee entering our facility, wear mask, glove and sanitize the facility and wash our hands consistently.

We've had one physician, and about 8 RNs contract it. All did well except one RN fatal.

Asked my wife this. Three docs (1 ER and 2 Hospitalists, numerous nurses). No hospitalizations. A doc at an area hospital did die from this.

Smaller rural hospital

Few physicians
Lots of frontline staff (RN, CNAs, RT, Radiology techs, ER staff) have tested positive. Only 1 bad hospitalization requiring intubation and ecmo. All other positives were not hospitalization required that I know of. No deaths

Moxley said:

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plain_o_llama said:

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How often are medical staff tested?

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At our facility it is when symptomatic or when there is a known exposure outside of work. We prescreen for symptoms before coming to work. No random or scheduled testing for staff outside of those criteria. No isolation or quarantine for exposure at work. If the coworker you sat next to at the nurses' station the entire shift turns up positive, no test and no quarantine for you so long as you don't have symptoms. Unlikely you would even be notified of exposure. They justify it by mandating mask wearing and eye protection at all times (although many of us have been forgoing face shields) and assume you are protected.

If we have a substantial contact with a positive case outside of work, we are to get notify the employee health department, get tested and self-isolate until the test is resulted. If negative, right back to work but closely monitor symptoms.

And IMO this has worked just fine. Given what we know about how PCR testing can pick up non-infectious viral fragments and how taxing quarantine would be on the healthcare system in terms of staffing, this approach is probably best.

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This actually seems like a very logical way to handle it as otherwise you'd run out of medical staff pretty quick. Here's a question: would it be prudent to assume those same criteria for the general public? For instance, since we are wearing masks, contact with positive patients only would warrant the person feeling any symptoms. No testing until then and no quarantine until you test positive. Thoughts? Or no? Asking docs.

My wife is an internal med PA and just got it from a patient who didn't realize he was positive as well (so she didn't have her normal PPE on). In general, there procedures have been effective, but there's only so much you can do.

As for her, she was pretty miserable for a few days but is fine now. She has lost most of her sense of taste and smell though.