Ascension Via Christi president optimistic about vaccine rollout

Health care professionals in the area are optimistic about the current rollout of COVID vaccinations.

“Huge impact with a lot of people, now we’re talking about big chunks of the county population,” says Copple.

A large portion of healthcare workers in the community still need to be vaccinated as part of phase one.  The Riley County Health Department hopes to finish those vaccinations by the end of the week.  Copple says 100% of the active medical staff at the hospital have been vaccinated.  He hopes this will inform the public how important getting vaccinated will be.

With this round of vaccinations finishing up, phase two can begin. This includes first responders, other essential workers, and education workers.  Copple says while there is still a lot of work ahead, starting the next round of vaccinations is a very positive step in the right direction.  The ideal number of vaccinations needed to make a difference is 85% of the eligible population.

“We already know that people can have immunity to COVID and still carry and transmit to others.  This is why we really need this high volume of the population to get vaccinated,” says Copple.

Copple also spoke about an issue they have been seeing throughout the pandemic; people not seeking medical help for non-COVID issues.  Early on in the pandemic, patients were not coming to the emergency room when they had heart attacks or strokes. Most of those people were scared of catching COVID while in the ER.

Copple says every ER waiting room is a negative airspace, as well as some negative air rooms.  The third floor of the hospital, which houses the COVID ward, is now a negative airspace.  They have technology that focuses just on airflow throughout the entire hospital.

This issue of not seeking medical help is also being reported from area physicians as well.  However, this could be attributed to less illnesses in the community from mask wearing, social distancing, and hand hygiene.  Copple says he and medical staff are still very concerned that people are not coming in when they need to.

“We always try to caution people that you kind of seek the level of care you need, and when you need to come to the emergency room, we want you to come to the emergency room,” says Copple. “When you have health issues, address them before they escalate.”

Copple says the hospital has made efforts to lower some of the costs of procedures to encourage people to get them and to make them more affordable with the pandemic.

Speaking of, Riley County has been seeing record breaking COVID hospitalizations over the past week, with 25 patients being the highest.  Copple says for a community of this size, this is a large number of hospitalizations.  The hospital is seeing a consistent number of being discharged and admitted for COVID.

These recent hospitalizations have been the result of smaller family gatherings, especially over the holidays. Some of the patients in the hospital together were siblings. Copple emphasized that small group gatherings do not mitigate the chance of catching COVID, it just decreases the number of people to spread.

“We’re seeing in the range of 50 to 65 new hospitalizations a day across the state. It’s kind of at a steady state right now, but this is not a good place to be,” says Copple.