Dr. Geoffrey Westrich shares an important story on COVID-19 and the Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) in New York City.
There has been a lot happening at HSS in NYC. We’ve converted our orthopedic hospital to a COVID-19 hospital and have turned our ambulatory ORs into ICUs, housing two critically ill ventilator patients per OR and having recently expanded this to include our 9th floor recovery room. We have floors dedicated strictly to COVID-19 patients, plus some of our orthopedic floors have been converted to med/surg floors to assist New York Presbyterian Hospital in making room for more COVID-19 patients. The community is providing much needed support and we have been receiving many inspirational messages from former patients.
As Co-Chairman of the Infection Control Committee at HSS, we find our mission has morphed into a COVID-19 Clinical Advisory Team that meets every day to make all policy for the hospital pertaining to screening, testing, PPE, etc. This is truly an unprecedented time, but we are well organized and will get through this crisis.
I would like to share this informative interview conducted by HealthLeaders with HSS President and CEO Lou Sharpiro, MD, where he discusses the Herculean task of flipping the HSS model from an orthopedic hospital to a general acute care model to help in the COVID-19 emergency.
Things are changing daily, but once we get through the peak, we will then work on how to best return to the “New Normal.”
Sincerely,
Geoffrey Westrich, MD
Professor of Clinical Orthopedic Surgery
Hospital for Special Surgery
Do you have a COVID-19 story you would like to share with fellow EOA members? Please submit your story, photo(s), article(s), or links to articles to [email protected]
