manager. "Staff are required to request the gear they need, and sign
for the amount they take."
Proliance Eastside Surgery Center in Kirkland, Wash., located in the
same town in which a nursing home had one of the worst COVID-19
outbreaks in the U.S. to date, was put on an allocation system for
gowns and masks by its vendor, according to Carmen M. Wilson, RN,
BSN, CIC, the facility's director. She says the center has yet to experi-
ence a shortage of PPE. Proliance began to perform emergent cases
only, and the allocations of PPE they're getting have been sufficient.
The N95 masks at MidHudson Regional Hospital "are like gold,"
according to Ms. Solomon, who says supplies are carefully distributed
and tracked.
Research shows the virus can be carried through fecal matter, so
physicians at Ms. Hogan's GI facility have been encouraged to wear
the N95 mask during procedures. She has an adequate amount of the
masks for now, and has given some to her physicians who are per-
forming urgent cases at the local hospital, where supplies are limited.
'Unprecedented times'
ASCA is encouraging its members to adapt to the rapidly changing
conditions by enrolling in CMS's "hospitals without walls" program,
which lets hospitals send urgent non-COVID-19 or more complex
surgical cases their way. ASCs can temporarily convert to urgent
care facilities or overflow ERs, serve as COVID-19 triage centers or
even provide a place for local hospital care teams to sleep. ASCA
assembled a document (osmag.net/CJR4gu) that outlines all the
ways in which ASCs could serve during the pandemic.
"We're focused on the mission of trying to make sure ASCs remain
open and are able to help however possible," says Mr. Prentice.
"Obviously, we're in unprecedented times, and the entire healthcare
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