Hospitals to resume elective surgeries
In accordance with Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s executive order and following the processes defined by the Arkansas Department of Health, Northwest Health resumed elective surgeries and procedures the week of Monday, April 27. These services were halted last month to comply with state orders.
“Our leadership teams and medical staffs have been working collaboratively on plans to restart our elective surgery program with the goals of ensuring the safety of our patients, physicians and staff,” said Denten Park, market chief executive officer for the system. “As always, our goal is to provide our community with the quality healthcare services they expect from Northwest Health in a safe environment. Additional safeguards, such as screening of each person as they enter our facilities and limitation of visitors, further minimizes any risks to patients and staff.”
In addition to standard environmental safety procedures, Northwest Health is continuing these additional protocols to ensure the health and safety of its patients, physicians and staff. These include:
• Limiting entry points
into the facilities
• Screening everyone
who enters the hospitals according to CDC guidelines – this includes staff, patients and visitors
• Requiring patients, visitors, physicians and staff members to wear masks while in the hospitals
• Maintaining social distancing protocols
• Restricting visitors,
with exceptions made for some patients including laboring and C-section mothers, pediatric patients, NICU patients, surgical patients and end-oflife situations
• Isolating any covid-19
positive patients and those
awaiting covid-19 test results to designated quarantine areas
• Performing pre-admission testing in designated areas to limit traffic within the hospital
• Testing all surgical patients for covid-19, as
required, during pre-admission testing
• Requiring all surgical
patients to self-quarantine
once covid-19 testing is
performed
“Throughout the co
vid-19 pandemic, our
patients’ and caregivers’ health and safety have been our primary concern,” Park said. “We are ramping up slowly to give ample opportunity to evaluate the processes we have in place and make adjustments as needed. Patients can be assured that we are taking every precaution to protect them and their families.”
To initiate care or reschedule a procedure that had to be postponed, patients should contact their physician or health care provider. In the case of an emergency, people should
call 911. Seeking treatment
for symptoms of a heart attack, stroke or other life-threatening emergency should never be delayed.