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2. welfare
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Oct.16, 2014
PRACTICING DONNING, DOFFING
NOTEWORTHY
Recognizing pastoral care
Chaplains will be making rounds to offer a
blessing of hands during Pastoral Care
Week, Oct. 19-25. They provide care for
spiritual needs in ways such as helping with
sadness and family worries, overcoming
fears, talking about death and dying, offering
spiritual resources, and finding hope, peace
and meaning in life.
The Rev. Greg McClain is director of spiritual care services, and the Rev. Kiki Barnes
is the clinical chaplain for Johnston Health
Hospice and the SECU Hospice House.
They get support from the 14 local pastors
and clergy persons who serve as chaplain
volunteers. These volunteers provide on-call
coverage for Johnston Health, Johnston
Health Clayton and the SECU Hospice
House.
Pat a case manager on the back
Take time out this week to say thanks to
Johnston Health’s Case Management
Team. It’s National Case Management
Week, and a great time to recognize the important work that case managers do. The 21member team is made up of RN case managers, social work case managers , clinical
documentation improvement RN specialists,
case management assistant and secretarial
support. They provide utilization management, care coordination, length-of-stay management, discharge planning, care transitions, resource management and patient
advocacy.
Fall Fest on Friday
Shop for one-of-a-kind gifts at Fall Fest,
which will be from 11 a.m. till 5 p.m. on Friday in the Johnston Medical Mall.
Raising breast cancer awareness
Johnston Health Clayton will host Ladies
Night Out from 5 till 7 p.m. on Oct. 28. The
women’s health event will include food, vendors and information about medical services.
Celebrating fall, Halloween
A costume contest, a free meal for employees and a silent auction of baked goods are
on tap for Halloween (Oct. 31) at Johnston
Health. All proceeds from the bake sale will
go toward the employee emergency fund.
Want to help out? Bring your baked goods to
the cafeteria from 7 till 9 a.m. The auction will
begin at 9 a.m. and end at 2 p.m.
Employees will be treated to lunch in the
cafeteria from 11 a.m. till 1:30 p.m. (A site in
Clayton will be determined.) For night shifts,
departments will be called to pick up meals
about 7 p.m.
Remembering loved ones
Johnston Health will hold its annual Community Memorial Service at 3 p.m. on Nov. 2 at
the Johnston County Agricultural Center on
N.C. 210, west of Smithfield. The service is
open to all who have experienced the loss of
a loved one. Participants are invited to bring
a fabric swatch representing their loved one.
These pieces will be sewn into a memorial
quilt.
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Hospital
gets ready
for PCI
Critical care transport
vital to cardiac service
Brandon Godwin, a nurse in the Smithfield emergency department, helps
paramedic student Josh Nichols double-glove during an impromptu training session Tuesday on how to gown up in personal protective equipment. Godwin is helping the ED staff prepare for the prospect of treating
a patient with Ebola.
Staff practices, prepares
for threat of Ebola virus
False alarms help ED tweak processes
T
wo patients who came to the
Smithfield emergency department on Wednesday were seen
and quickly ruled out as having
Ebola. Such false alarms are
becoming fairly common in hospital EDs
across the country as the public becomes
jittery about the threat of the virus.
Ronnie Syverson, infection preventionist for Johnston Health, says the two
separate cases had one thing in common:
Both patients had traveled or been in
contact with someone who had traveled
outside of the U.S. But neither of those
destinations had been to a country affected by the Ebola outbreak, he says.
Asking the right questions is key to
determining if patients have contracted
the virus. “We can’t be fearful. We have
to stay focused. We have stick to the
facts,” he says. “The risk of contracting
the illness here in the U.S. is still very
low. We all need to find peace in that.”
To aid and educate the staff, Syverson
is sharing an Ebola screen, which consists of three pertinent questions for patients. “These are the pieces of the puzzle,” he says. “These are the questions we
should be asking.”
 Have you traveled outside the U.S.
to a country affected by the Ebola outbreak within in the last 30 days?  Have you come in contact with anyone having symptoms and diagnosed or
suspected of having Ebola?  Do you have any of the follow symptoms: fever of greater than 101.5, headache, muscle pain, vomiting, diarrhea,
abdominal pain, unexplained bleeding or
bruising? “If the answer to all three questions is
yes, then it’s reasonable to be suspicious,”
Syverson says. In the clinical setting, the
staff member would then give patient a
mask to don and call the ED charge nurse
right away.
In both cases on Wednesday, Syverson
says the ED followed proper procedures and
protocols, including isolating the patients
and decontaminating EMS responders.
“This was good practice,” he says. “It allowed us to identify areas that we need to
improve.”
Over the past several days, Syverson says
a committee of directors and senior staff has
been meeting to put together and shape a
policy specifically for Ebola. As the Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention sends
out new information daily, the committee
makes changes.
“It’s a living, breathing document,” he
adds. When it’s complete sometime next
week, the committee will post it on Quicklinks.
Among other things, the ED staff has
been practicing donning and doffing personal protective equipment.
Outside the hospital, Syverson meets on
Mondays with representatives from Johnston County agencies: EMS, the office of
emergency management, the 911 emergency
call center and the health department. They
also listen in to the daily teleconferences
from the CDC.
“We’re doing everything we can to prepare,” he says. “We’re keeping each other
informed, and we’re working and planning
together.”
Want to learn more about Ebola? Check
out the websites for the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control to get up-to-date and factual information.
We wish her well
Volunteers, physicians and staff are invited to a reception honoring Linda Allen, chief
nursing officer for Johnston Health, who is retiring after having worked with the hospital
for more than 30 years. The reception is from 2 till 4 p.m. on Oct. 29 in the cafeteria.
The addition of a critical-care transport service at Johnston Health is the latest step in
getting ready for interventional cardiology
procedures, including stenting, set to begin in
January.
Rex Critical Care Transport is opening a hub
here in Smithfield, and it will begin aroundthe-clock service on Monday. The transport
team will have its quarters along the hallway
behind the emergency department and will
park its ambulance near the bay.
Last month, Johnston County Commissioners approved a franchise for the critical-care
transport service. From its base at the hospital,
the ambulance will respond to calls also from
hospitals in neighboring counties.
“It’s a traveling ICU unit,” says Tracey Carson, who is the administrative director overseeing the interventional cardiology program.
“It has all the tools, including a ventilator, to
get critically ill patients safely to a hospital
that can offer more specialized care.”
When Johnston Health begins its interventional cardiology program, Carson says Rex
Critical Care will provide a second, dedicated
ambulance. On procedure days, the ambulance
will park at the Women’s Pavilion entrance,
which is closest to the cath lab.
Also, Carson says Johnston Health has an
agreement with Rex Hospital to treat those
patients who may need open-heart surgery. A
requirement of the program is that the hospital
must transport those patients, from the cath lab
to the hospital offering open-heart surgery,
within 90 minutes.
Drs. Willis Woo and Matthew Hook, interventional cardiologists with N.C. Heart &
Vascular, will perform the procedures. These
will be done in the existing cath lab until the
hospital gets state approval to build a larger
lab. An architect is now preparing the drawings for a shell space next to the ED. If all
goes as planned, the new lab could be ready
by May.
Following the procedures, specially trained
staff will care for the patients in designated
cardiac-observations rooms on the bridge of
second floor (formerly 2 East). These rooms
will have telemetry so that staff at the bedside,
at the nursing station around the corner, and in
the ICU can all see the patients heart monitors.
Carson says the cath lab staff has been training since August with their peers at Rex.
To get the lab ready, the hospital has purchased an intravascular ultra sound system.
Using catheters, physicians can get images of
diseased blood vessels from inside the artery.
It provides detailed and accurate measurements of the vessel and areas of plaque.
Also significant, directors of the Johnston
Health board approved the interventional cardiology program at their September meeting.
Meet the critical care teams
You’re invited to meet the Rex Critical Care
Transport team during a gathering at 4:30 p.m.
on Oct. 23 at the Smithfield emergency department’s ambulance bay. In addition, UNC
Air Care will be on the helipad, weather permitting, to offer a peek inside its helicopter.
All who come to the meet-and-greet event will
be eligible to enter a drawing for two floorseat tickets to the N.C. State vs. South Florida
basketball game on Nov. 23 at PNC Arena.
Take time to come out and welcome these
critical-care transport teams, whose services
will enhance the care and treatment of our
patients here in Smithfield and Clayton.