Editor' Note The American College of Surgeons (ACS) on April 17 released a new document, “Local Resumption of Elective Surgery Guidance,” to help healthcare facilities prepare to resume elective surgery once COVID-19 has peaked in their area. The document includes four categories: COVID Awareness—addresses the community’s COVID-19 numbers, including prevalence,…

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Editor's Note: The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on April 19 issued recommendations on how hospitals and healthcare systems can protect their staff and patients as they reopen for nonemergent care. The new recommendations update earlier guidance on limiting nonessential surgical and medical procedures and are specifically targeted…

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Editor's Note The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on April 14 released a Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report on the characteristics of healthcare workers (HCW) with COVID-19 in the US. From February 12 to April 9, 2020, there were 9,282 cases of COVID-19 reported among HCWs. The median…

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Editor's Note The American Nurses Foundation, the philanthropic arm of the American Nurses Association (ANA), has launched the Coronavirus Response Fund for Nurses, enabling the public to demonstrate their support and thank nurses. The fund will address identified, emerging needs of nurses by: providing direct assistance to nurses serving on…

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Editor's Note In this study, Elizabeth Wick, MD, and colleagues at the University of California at San Francisco develop a surgery-triage plan to reduce OR volume and manage healthcare resources during the COVID-19 pandemic. Their comprehensive rapid response plan included: Reducing OR volume by 80% to ensure adequate capacity to…

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Editor's Note ECRI Institute and RLDatix announced April 13 a new collaboration to provide free empathetic communication and caring for the caregiver training programs. The first program will be an April 16 webcast that combines the clinical side of the COVID-19 battle (the head) with the need to provide emotional…

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Editor's Note This study from the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, finds that a susceptible, infected, removed (SIR) epidemic model can be adapted to local population characteristics to inform hospital planning for epidemic-related surges in hospital capacity. Using COVID-19 patients only, the SIR model estimated that it would be 31 to…

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Editor's Note As hospitals face a surge of COVID-19 patients, the ability for them to care for trauma cases and medical and surgical emergencies is severely compromised. Because of this, the American College of Surgeons (ACS) on April 7 issued a statement calling for strategies to preserve capacity and capability…

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Editor's Note The Joint Commission, in its April 8 online newsletter, announced the creation of a web portal with resources to assist healthcare workers create capacity for surge patients with COVID-19. Included are: Use of Ambulatory Surgery Centers (ASC) as Alternative Care Sites for Hospitals Emergency Management Healthcare Environment Checklist…

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Editor's Note During the first 3 weeks of the COVID-19 outbreak in the Seattle area, the most common reasons for ICU admission were hypoxemic respiratory failure leading to mechanical ventilation and/or hypotension requiring vasopressor treatment, and mortality was high in these critically ill patients, this study finds. In this analysis…

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