Columbus, OH,
10
March
2020
|
16:54 PM
Europe/Amsterdam

NBC4: Negative Pressure Rooms Ready for Hospitalized COVID-19 Patients

 

 

 

On March 9, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine recently announced that three Ohioans have tested positive for COVID-19 (coronavirus). While these patients are all in the Cleveland area, COVID-19 has been on OhioHealth’s radar for the last few months and continues to be a focus of our conversations, meetings and planning.

OhioHealth has negative pressure hospital rooms for any patient that would be hospitalized at OhioHealth with COVID-19, to provide a safe environment for our patients, associates, physicians and visitors.

Negative pressure rooms are used for patients who have contagious diseases. Looking at them, you probably wouldn’t notice right away that they are different from any other patient room. However, the air that circulates in those rooms remains contained and isn’t released into any other part of the hospital.

Jo Henman is the director of infection prevention for OhioHealth. In a recent interview with NBC4 reporter Ted Hart, Henman talked about the features of these rooms.

“(Negative pressure rooms have their) own dedicated exhaust system and (air) is exhausted at the top of the building, but only after it goes through a special filter that filters out 99.97 percent of anything in the air,” Henman told NBC4.

Throughout the system, OhioHealth has 85 negative pressure rooms, but can create more if needed through portable HEPA filters.

“You can use high-efficiency particulate airflow filters that will allow you to put it in a regular room and create the same negative airflow,” Henman told NBC4.

OhioHealth is also taking precautions to make sure the people who would care for COVID-19 patients remain safe. Providers have been trained in the process of wearing specialized gowns, masks, face shields and gloves. You can watch a video demonstrating how staff members prepare to enter a room by clicking here.

“Our plan for COVID-19 patients is to have dedicated cohort staff, so if we have one patient, then we have one nurse that would care for that patient and they would not care for any other patients for that shift,” Henman told NBC4.

You can view the NBC4 story by clicking on their logo below.