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Dear Community Partners, Get vaccinated. Wear a facemask – especially in public indoor settings. Social distance. Wash your hands. It’s déjà vu. These are all precautions we have heard and hopefully practiced during the COVID-19 pandemic. Now, with the highly transmissible and contagious delta variant in our region, these precautions are advised again, even for…

Dear Community Partners, Just three hours and 28 minutes away from Topeka, a COVID-19 nightmare is playing out. Hospitals in southwest Missouri are overwhelmed with patients as the delta variant surges. Deaths are mounting. The two Springfield hospitals reported 27 COVID deaths last weekend alone. As of the past Monday, those hospitals combined had had…

Dear Community Partners, We are at a crossroads in the COVID-19 pandemic that will define our lives and our community’s future. While there is mounting frustration among us – those who believe in or who dispel the value of the vaccines – we individually must listen to our conscience as a guide. As you consider…

Dear Community Partners, Beginning with today’s COVID-19 Scorecard, we will provide the vaccination status of hospitalized patients. We will also be providing the number of COVID-19 patient discharges and deaths from the previous day and cumulative numbers of hospitalized and discharged patients and deaths. We are adding context to the COVID-19 positive testing rate related…

Dear Community Partners, Like other hospitals across the region, we have a growing concern about how the nursing shortage impacts our ability to care for our communities in the middle of a pandemic. As a regional hospital that provides a layer of support to smaller critical access hospitals, we take care of patients transferred to…

Dear Community Partners, All the indicators of community spread of COVID-19 are on the rise: inpatient admissions, patients in the Enhanced Primary Care, drive up COVID-19 testing, and calls this week to the “Call Before You Go” hotline. The Enhanced Primary Care program provides supportive outpatient services to help keep people out of the hospital.…

Dear Community Partners, All the indicators of community spread of COVID-19 are on the rise: inpatient admissions, patients in the Enhanced Primary Care, drive up COVID-19 testing, and calls this week to the “Call Before You Go” hotline. The Enhanced Primary Care program provides supportive outpatient services to help keep people out of the hospital.…

Dear Community Partners, Today we have 31 inpatients who are suffering from COVID-19 infections. Of those, 17 are in intensive care or intermediate care, and the others are being cared for in regular medical patient rooms. The past couple of days more of our COVID-19 patients have needed a higher level of care. Intensive care…

Dear Community Partners, August often is a month we see transitions and new beginnings. A new school year starts. Fall sports leagues begin their practices. The hot, humid summer temperatures begin the transition into fall with cooler nights. Gardeners see their summer gardens winding up, but can plant cool season vegetables to take them into…

Dear Community Partners, Demand for adult inpatient beds continues to outpace supply. Like most healthcare organizations in Kansas we are facing staffing challenges, which means we are unable to take all of the patients needing a transfer for hospital care. Because the COVID-19 surge is widespread across the Midwest, the situation is further exacerbated. From…

Dear Community Partners, The resistance of some to get a COVID-19 vaccine may at times be less about resistance and more about barriers. I recently learned of a situation in which a person “resisting” the vaccine was actually willing to get it but resisted because of language barriers she faced. The person believed she didn’t…

Dear Community Partners, Here are today’s updates: COVID-19 Scorecard (Scorecard: English | Spanish) COVID-19 Vaccines COVID-19 Scorecard Here’s a look at today’s COVID-19 scorecard: We have 55 inpatients who are COVID-19 positive. The percentage of hospital patients who are unvaccinated is 85%. Vaccinated is defined as fully vaccinated individuals for greater than 14 days since the last immunization.…

Dear Community Partners, Here are today’s updates: COVID-19 Scorecard COVID-19 Vaccines COVID-19 Scorecard Here’s a look at today’s COVID-19 scorecard: We have 55 inpatients who are COVID-19 positive. The percentage of hospital patients who are unvaccinated is 85%. Vaccinated is defined as fully vaccinated individuals for greater than 14 days since the last immunization. From…

Dear Community Partners, Today marks a wonderful milestone for Stormont Vail Health and for 41 of our nurses. We are celebrating the completion of a nurse residency program by these new graduate nurses. This is a program that was developed through the work of an interdisciplinary team to help new nurses receive a thorough orientation…

Dear Community Partners, Here are today’s updates: COVID-19 Scorecard (English and Spanish) COVID-19 Vaccines COVID-19 Scorecard Here’s a look at today’s COVID-19 scorecard: We have 54 inpatients who are COVID-19 positive. The percentage of hospital patients who are unvaccinated is 83%. Vaccinated is defined as fully vaccinated individuals for greater than 14 days since the…

Dear Community Partners, We are facing a difficult and dire situation in the COVID-19 pandemic. It is important that we have a full understanding of what this means to us and the health care in our communities. Our hospital is full. At the start of today, all of our hospital’s adult inpatient rooms were filled…

Dear Community Partners, There are many hands working together to help keep our community healthy in the COVID-19 pandemic. One important team is at our Infusion Center in Topeka where we provide monoclonal antibody treatment to COVID-19 outpatients. This is a treatment given to patients who are at high risk for developing severe symptoms from…

Dear Community Partners, Changing our Emergency Department to diversion status – which means ambulances carrying patients are diverted to another hospital – is a difficult decision to make. However, it is one that has been made more often the past year. During diversions, our front door to the ED remains open and we continue to…

Dear Community Partners, Urgent care can feel more urgent in a pandemic. The COVID-19 virus – and especially its delta variant – is tricky, with disease symptoms that can vary widely. Plus, this is a novel virus that we are still learning about, but much remains unknown. Are these symptoms a cold or COVID? Is…

Dear Community Partners, Here are today’s updates: COVID-19 Scorecard (English and Spanish) COVID-19 Vaccines COVID-19 Scorecard Here’s a look at today’s COVID-19 scorecard: We have 22 inpatients who are COVID-19 positive. The percentage of hospital patients who are unvaccinated over the past 30 days is 64%. Vaccinated is defined as fully vaccinated individuals for greater…