Another slight decrease today in the number of COVID-19 patients being treated at The University of Kansas Health System. 23 are in the hospital, compared to 25 yesterday. Ten of those patients are in the ICU, same as yesterday, with 3 on ventilators, down from 6 yesterday. In all, the hospital has 30 COVID-19 patients who have gone past the acute symptom stage and are in the convalescent stage.
Carol Barnett had a heart transplant during COVID-19 when she couldn’t have family and friends around to support her. To hear folks tell it, her name should be in the dictionary under “resilient.” Carol’s transplant surgeon Matthew Danter and cardiologist Nicholas Haglund joined the call.
Having a heart transplant is tough enough under any circumstances. But Carol Barnett found out she needed one just as the pandemic began. After her three-day evaluation in the hospital in April, doctors told her she was too sick to leave, and from then until May 8th, the day of her transplant, she was unable to have any visitors, though her husband was allowed two brief visits. Now that she’s had her transplant, she feels great and has been able to walk 4-5 miles a day, resume gardening and cooking and best of all, have visits from her family and grandchildren. She puts it into perspective by saying while there are some with COVID-19 and other diseases struggling to stay alive, “I’ve been given a gift to extend my life.” She finds having another person’s heart beating inside a miracle and extremely humbling. She’s not afraid of COVID-19 because she takes all the right precautions and says she can “find joy in every moment of the day.”
Carol’s transplant surgeon, Dr. Danter, discussed how the program was able to continue during the pandemic. He said putting it on hold was not an option because it would cause bad outcomes for many patients. He described all of the extra precautions taken at both the donor site and the hospital and said even donors, though deceased, were tested for the virus before accepting the heart. He says he could not have asked for a better outcome than the one Carol has experienced.
Dr. Haglund, her cardiologist, explained that Carol was a lot sicker than she realized and told how they knew it was time for her to have a transplant. He described the special challenges for heart patients during a pandemic. He also said it could be very risky for children in a family with a heart transplant patient to go back to school. He said it was a pleasure taking care of Carol.
Dana Hawkinson, MD, medical director of infection prevention and control at The University of Kansas Health System, says it appears the 7-day running average of COVID-19 cases in Kansas City is down, and says an increase in mask wearing and social distancing has definitely helped. He explained what the percent positive testing rate means and how it’s figured and emphasized there’s still no safer place to be than the hospital during the pandemic as there have been no cases of the virus being transmitted inside the health system.
Steve Stites, MD, chief medical officer at The University of Kansas Health System, says when it comes to sending your kids back to school, there’s no right answer. Every family’s situation is different, and they must make that personal decision based on what’s best for them. He says one of the challenges during a pandemic is to find joy and peace, and we should all make it a goal to find that every day.
Wednesday, August 26 at 8:00 a.m. is the next morning media update. It’s back-to-school week at The University of Kansas, and we’ll be joined by Chancellor Dr. Doug Girod to see how reopening during the pandemic is going. Joining him will be Chris Wilson, VP of Systems Innovation and Integration at The University of Kansas Health System who helped oversee COVID-19 testing for everyone on campus.
ATTENTION: media procedure for calling in:
The meeting is available by Zoom, both video and by phone. To join the Zoom Meeting by video, click https://kumc-ois.zoom.us/j/7828978628
Telephone dial-in Participants:
For those without Zoom, call 1-253-215-8782, meeting ID: 782 897 8628.
The feed is also available via TVU grid. The TVU source is UoK_Health and is being made available to all.
Feel free to send questions in advance to medicalnewsnetwork@kumc.edu.
