On Tuesday, Gov. Tim Walz announced executive order 2-52, allowing elective procedures to resume as soon as May 11. RiverView Health President and CEO Carrie Michalski said the order is a step forward toward returning to normal by 
bringing the decision on procedures back into the hands of local physicians. “It was very appreciated news, and it’s going to bring the decision of when it’s safe to do surgeries and procedures that are not urgent back in the hands of local physicians,” said Michalski. “We feel that’s a huge step forward in terms of returning to normal and being able to serve all the patients that need our services outside of what we’re doing with COVID.”
Michalski said the staff at RiverView Health are working on establishing guidelines for reintegrating elective procedures. “The first thing is the safety for everyone involved,” said Michalski. “Those that would be seeking routine care, non-urgent procedures, and things they would be prepared for, we need those patients to be in the safest hands and conditions. And we also need to monitor what’s going on with COVID. Monday, we do have the green light to resume doing non-urgent procedures, but we won’t be turning that light switch on fully. We’ve got a framework we are developing, some guidelines, an interdisciplinary team working on that today and tomorrow to look at finalizing what that will look like at RiverView Health. The important thing is the decision will now be driven locally by our physicians.”
One question the interdisciplinary team will have to consider is the availability of medications that are often readily available for sedation being in short supply due to their use in sedating critical COVID-19 patients around the country, according to Michalski. “In normal times, we can, for the most part, assume that the right medications and supplies are going to be available when a surgeon decides to move forward with a procedure,” said Michalski. “In the current state, with all the disruption in the supply chain, we need to be careful and plan for that very well. So, pharmacy and our supply chain leaders are going to play a big role in monitoring the supplies and equipment that are needed to perform these procedures. Pharmacy is going to play a big role in resuming procedures as well because a lot of the paralytic or sedation medications that have been used around the globe to sedate individuals while they are intubated as part of their COVID treatment are often the same drugs that we’re using to sedate patients for surgical procedures. So, a lot of those medications are in short supply right now.”
As procedures start back up, Michalski asked that patients wait for the hospital to call them to schedule their surgery. “Today and tomorrow, we’re still working through finalizing the criteria and the process based on what the governor and Minnesota Department of Health have asked us to do to resume surgery safely,” said Michalski. “This week it’s don’t call us, we will call you if you are a candidate if there is something that has some urgency that has been delayed. Or if there is a procedure that uses very little supplies and is a same-day procedure, our physician offices will be reaching out to you to get you on the schedule. Now, if it goes a couple of weeks and you haven’t heard something, certainly give us a call, but we will be working through that and reaching out to our patients that have had something delayed or not scheduled.”
Michalski also said there could be some fits and starts in providing elective procedures based on the ebb and flow of COVID cases throughout the community. “The second thing is because this is a fluid situation, if there would be another hot spot or an outbreak in the community, there is the potential that a surgery could get canceled on short notice if it’s a non-emergent surgery,” said Michalski. “We would ask our community to be understanding of that. We don’t ever want to cancel surgeries after someone has made a plan, but safety is of the utmost importance.”
RiverView will be able to treat both critical COVID-19 patients and perform elective procedures as long as there is room to separate the two, and adequate supplies said, Michalski. “As long as it’s normal volumes in the hospital, we will be able to do both things at the same time,” said Michalski. “But, when we get into a situation that we are treating COVID patients on the in-patient side, one of the things were going to want to do is to separate teams that are taking care of COVID patients from the team that’s taking care of health or well patients having other needs. We’ll work to separate those teams to have dedicated teams for taking care of COVID patients, and other groups of our staff separated to keep operating surgical procedures and those types of things. It’s going to be a balance of what the needs are in each area, and obviously, COVID treatment for somebody that is critically ill is something we can’t delay. So, that’s where the resources will go if we don’t have the resources to cover both types of business.”
Michalski added that RiverView has provided support for COVID-19 patients, but no one has been hospitalized in Crookston. “We have not had a hospitalized COVID patient in our facilities,” said Michalski. “We have members of our staff that are helping to support patients that are COVID positive that are quarantined at home. From time to time, those individuals need a little extra help, and we might see them in our emergency room or through a video visit, things that are needed to support their care.”
Tags:
