The week starts on a positive note when it comes to the number of COVID-19 patients being treated at The University of Kansas Health system. 24 patients are being treated for COVID-19, down from 36 on Friday. 11 of those patients are in the ICU, down from 15 Friday. 13 patients are being checked for the virus. Overall, 59 patients recovering from COVID-19 have been discharged from The University of Kansas Health System to date.
Dr. Damien Stevens, a pulmonary and critical care physician at The University of Kansas Health System, joined the panel by phone. Dr. Stevens recently returned from Queens, New York where he spent a week on the front lines helping other doctors care for the overwhelming number of patients being treated for COVID-19. He’s at home doing telehealth appointments with patients while also in quarantine. He says it was eerie seeing the streets of New York so empty, but shocking to see people jammed into the lobby and waiting areas of the hospital. He says in the 450-bed hospital where he was helping, 80 to 90 percent of the patients were being treated for COVID-19. He described how staff had to convert different areas of the hospital to care for all the COVID-19 patients because all the ICU beds were full. He said in a regular ICU, the nurse to patient ratio is 1 to 1 or 2 to 1 at most. In the hospital where he helped, the usual ratio was one nurse caring for 8, sometimes 10 patients. Dr. Stevens’ biggest message is without social distancing, good hand hygiene and stay-at-home rules, our area hospitals could quickly look like those in New York. He says the more prematurely society is opened, the more people will die.
Dr. Steve Stites, chief medical officer at the health system, stressed that today’s planned protests over extension of the stay-at-home orders are a bad idea because people won’t be keeping six feet from each other, won’t all be using hand sanitizer and probably won’t cough into their sleeves. He says the evidence is overwhelming such gatherings, while allowing people their right to protest, will spread the disease. He also addresses whether the region has seen a peak in COVID-19 cases, and he talks about how health departments use contact tracing to help control the spread of the disease
Dana Hawkinson, MD, medical director of infection prevention and control at The University of Kansas Health System says while the numbers look good now, they’ll change in a heartbeat if we open society too soon. He says it must happen in a thoughtful manner. He adds that community-wide testing will be the key to deciding how well the disease had been contained, something that’s not yet possible with the limited amount of testing available. And he says the antibody testing many are hoping will help are still not very reliable.
Tuesday, April 21 at 8:00 a.m. is the next daily briefing call. Joining the panel is Dr. Ragu Dendi, a doctor in cardiovascular medicine at The University of Kansas Health System and he will talk about everything related to living with chronic heart conditions during a time of COVID. He will offer insight into where did all the heart attacks go and answer questions about the blood clotting caused by C-19? Plus, offer his opinion on whether Aspirin is helpful or harmful in protecting against C-19?
We will also be talking with a patient who has recovered from COVID-19.
The feed is now available via TVU grid. The TVU source is UoK_Health and is being made available to all. You will still need to call-in to ask questions.
Telephone dial-in Participants:
Dial: 1-913-588-2222, and enter 50041981# when prompted for the Call ID. Feel free to send questions in advance to medicalnewsnetwork@kumc.edu.
