Providence Portland Medical Center has a COVID outbreak that infects more than 49 people

Providence’s medical center has a COVID-19 outbreak of 49 people in hospital, Providence officials admitted Friday afternoon after being listed in a state report.

Of the 49 cases identified by the hospital, 13 were patients when they were exposed and another 36 were ‘caregivers’. (The hospital did not answer a question about whether the outbreak had spread to the wider Portland community, affecting contact with Providence patients and staff.)

On the one hand, hospitals are a high-risk environment serving COVID-19 patients. On the other hand, hospitals are supposed to put in place the strictest infection controls. But that did not prevent a major outbreak.

The Providence patients were not on a COVID-19 ward when the outbreak occurred. Instead, say nursing officials, the outbreak was at 4k, a rehabilitation unit for patients, where people recover from traumatic brain injuries, strokes and similar injuries.

Providence officials say the hospital has “proactively” addressed the crisis.

“On December 22, we had a COVID-19 outbreak in an 18-bed unit at Providence Portland Medical Center,” said Gary Walker, director of communications for Providence in Oregon.

Walker says all but one of the patients were discharged. “One patient is still being treated for non-COVID-related conditions,” he says. “Providence proactively tested 217 caregivers who either worked on the unit or came in contact with patients from the unit. Of the group, 36 caregivers tested positive. As of today, 24 of the 36 have returned to work.”

The last positive COVID-19 test of the outbreak was on Dec. 31, Walker said, and the unit was closed, cleaned and not reopened yet.

Oregon Nurses Association officials and members recounted another series of events, which challenged the idea that the hospital was at the peak of the crisis.

Sarah Brown, a unit nurse who spoke to WW as a member of the union campaigning for safety changes, the first case arose inexplicably earlier in December in a patient who had previously tested negative before being admitted to the ward.

The hospital at the time did not detect contact with the patient, as far as Brown knows, or tested nurses and patients on the unit until a group of nurses and patients began reporting symptoms a week or ten days later, Brown said. WW.

Brown says she believes almost every nurse in the department, but she is positive for COVID-19.

How did she escape the virus?

She wore a ‘just tested’ N95 mask, which means she has the highest protection. She received the N95, which protects the carrier if it is well-suited, just because she had to work on a COVID-19 floor earlier this year.

“I believe that’s why I was negative,” Brown said. “I looked after patients who tested positive.”

The hospital did not choose to make the higher quality respirator mask available to all nurses and to fit nurses for it, she and others with the ONA say.

Brown said the hospital was able to fit N95s for all the nurses, and made sure there was safe ventilation and good contact detection for the initial case.

“According to my observation, I think it was several things that went wrong that only ended up in a disaster,” she said.

Oregon Nurses Association spokesman Kevin Mealy says some nurses have not been notified of the outbreak for four days – specifically the pool of nurses floating around the hospital and filling out where necessary, a delay that puts the risk at others nurses and patients possibly increase throughout the hospital.

The outbreak comes amid a bitter, ongoing dispute between Providence and its nursing association over whether they are adequately protected.

Precautionary nurse Kim Martin, who is on the union’s bargaining committee, says she has asked management for N95 masks for nurses. “I had [nurses] tell me that when they get on the COVID floor, they feel safe, “she says. The reason: They get better access to even higher quality protective equipment.

“It’s sad, disturbing and frustrating,” Martin said, arguing that the hospital had to agree to the union’s demands for safety at some point over the past ten months. “I know COVID was difficult for people all over the country, but if the Providence agreed to what the nurses asked for ten months ago in their ‘COVID Bill of Rights’, a lot of anxiety, a lot of frustration and a lot of anger and a lot of illness could be prevented. ‘

The union’s demands include guaranteed access to staff testing, ‘appropriate’ personal protective equipment, paid time off in the event of a diagnosis of COVID-19, as well as a suspicion that they got COVID-19 to work.

Providence did not answer questions from WW about the source of the outbreak, whether air quality or poor ventilation played a role, whether adequate protective equipment was provided to nurses and whether it would change in the future.

The hospital also did not answer a question as to why some nurses may not have been notified of the exposure risk immediately.

Walker at Providence says the hospital is conducting “genomic testing” – an apparent attempt to determine if the new, more contagious strain of COVID-19 arrived in Oregon and affected the spread of the virus in this case.

An Oregon health authority said: ‘OHA, in partnership with the [U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention], has been closely monitoring laboratory test results in Oregon in an effort to detect new variants (mutations) of the COVID-19 virus, including the variant that recently emerged in the United Kingdom. So far, the variant in Oregon has not been detected in any case. ‘

OHA officials declined to comment on the outbreak at Providence and said “we can not comment on an individual outbreak.”

The outbreak comes as the vaccine arrived in the state, and it’s another reminder of the interests associated with the delayed attempt.

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