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INFECTION PREVENTION
mandatory surgical masks for any staff who've not gotten flu shots.
That goes for anyone, by the way. Employees, physicians, students —
even vendors — must wear a mask in our facility if they can't prove
receipt of a flu shot.
The vaccine, even if it's not 100% effective, is still your best line of
defense against influenza. Vaccination can reduce the severity of the
illness and symptoms, which may shorten the duration or keep pneumonia or other more serious effects from settling in. But because this
year's vaccine is only a moderate 62% effective, according to the CDC,
it's important to reinforce other preventive actions. We're stressing
hand hygiene within the facility, but also reminding staff to carry hand
sanitizer and even surgical masks for use when they're away from the
facility.
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Patient screens. We start contacting patients 2 weeks out from
their surgeries, initially to get them scheduled, with perhaps a
check-in, and then the pre-op phone call a couple days before. So
each patient gets 2 or 3 contacts from us before they show up, just as
a matter of customer service (which helps make them more comfortable in the facility when they arrive).
But now we're able to ask at each step about flu-like symptoms
(fever, cough, chills) and whether they've been sick at all recently.
It's also smart to ask if any family or close friends have been sick,
and whether the patient may have been exposed. The earlier you
F E B R U A R Y 2013 | O U T PAT I E N T S U R G E R Y M A G A Z I N E O N L I N E
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