As the new coronavirus spreads, hospitals around the country have quarantined employees.
Here are five of the them:
Note: This is not an exhaustive list.
1. Sutter Santa Rosa (Calif.) Regional Hospital this week ordered a quarantine for at least 30 of its employees who had contact with a patient with COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus from China, the union representing most front-line hospital staff told The Press Democrat. Hospital officials would not confirm the quarantine to the newspaper. But a Sutter Health spokesperson issued a statement to Becker's Hospital Review, that isolating and masking ill patients, hand-washing and room-cleaning protocols remain its best defense for employees and patients.
2. Doctors Hospital of Sarasota (Fla.) ordered a quarantine for several healthcare workers who had contact with a patient who was treated for COVID-19 at the facility, a state health official told the Herald-Tribune. The state health official, G. Steve Huard, public information officer for the Florida Department of Health in Sarasota County, said workers are not sick but have been isolated at home as a precaution.
3. The New York Times reported that 24 nurses at the University of California Davis Medical Center in Sacramento were asked to self-quarantine after a patient tested positive for COVID-19.
4. At Kirkland, Wash.-based EvergreenHealth, nurses reported to the Washington State Nurses Association that they were told to self-quarantine but then were called back to their jobs. Mary Shepler, RN, BSN, the chief nursing officer of EvergreenHealth, told The New York Times that after quarantining some virus-exposed workers, the organization determined the extent of the quarantine was unrealistic because it left workforce shortages. Nurses who were asymptomatic were brought back into work.
5. Kaiser Permanente Westside Medical Center in Hillsboro, Ore., quarantined dozens of hospital staff due to possible contact with COVID-19, The Oregonian reported. Michael Foley, a spokesperson for Kaiser, told Becker's Hospital Review the medical center had 75 employees on paid administrative leave. He said 30 of the employees will be returning to work over the weekend, with more to follow daily, as the 14 days from contact passes for each person.
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