Hospitals prepare to implement crisis standards Written by Geoffrey Plant on December 9, 2020
New Mexico Human Services Department Secretary Dr. David Scrase announced during a press update Tuesday that the state is preparing to implement its crisis standards of care plan, which establishes resource allocation protocols for hospitals that are increasingly overwhelmed by COVID-19 patients.
The state’s plan is based on a national framework originally developed in response to the H1N1 influenza pandemic in 2009 and codified nationally in 2018, when it was also adopted by New Mexico. Earlier this year, the state’s medical advisory team undertook an update of that plan in an effort led by the state Department of Health informed by 140 health experts divided into work groups. One of their primary tasks was to grapple with the ethical issues of rationing care if resources became so scarce that not all pe
December 28, 2020
Four COVID deaths mar Christmas week as vaccine rolls out Written by Geoffrey Plant on December 28, 2020
For several weeks, the number of new daily reported positive coronavirus test results has been on a downward trend in New Mexico but over much of the same period, Grant County has seen its highest rates of new infection since the start of the pandemic. Thirteen people have died here due to COVID-19, with the first two deaths occurring at the end of July, and with seven of the 13 having died since Dec. 1. The N.M. Department of Health reported Sunday that a Grant County man in his 70s who had been hospitalized had died due to COVID-19. On Christmas Day, the department reported that two Grant County men one in his 70s who had been hospitalized, and another in his 80s with underlying conditions had died due to the coronavirus, and last Wednesday, the department reported that a
December 11, 2020
Gov: Reset slowed virus, but ‘we have a long way to go’ Written by Geoffrey Plant on December 11, 2020
(Screen Capture by Geoffrey Plant)
N.M. Human Services Secretary Dr. David Scrase suggested during his and Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s weekly COVID-19 press update that residents should consider completing a “New Mexico Medical Orders for Scope of Treatment” form, otherwise known as an advance directive. “You don’t want to put your family in a position where it’s a dire emergency and you haven’t had that conversation” about “what we want at the end of life,” Scrase said, encouraging folks to download the form at nmmost.org.
(Press Staff Photo by Geoffrey Plant)
Gila Regional Medical Center Emergency Medical Services EMTs Laurie Tavonatti and Alyssa Bell check supplies inside their favorite ambulance, EMS 2803, on Tuesday, after a particularly busy night of service calls and patient transfers. Six two-person crews of EMTs and paramedics work each shift at Gila Regional’s EMS station and substations.
Due to the coronavirus pandemic, Grant County’s first responders are busier than ever this year and unlike most other professionals, those employed in EMS, law enforcement and as firefighters don’t get a break for the holidays. Because patients who would normally have been admitted to the now-shuttered Gila Regional Medical Center Behavioral Health Unit are now transferred elsewhere, as far away as Albuquerque or Las Vegas, N.M., as well as due to an influx of COVID-19 patients all in addition to the usual number of trauma, stroke and other patients who need to go to Gila Regional Medical Center o
Daily Press sues hospital for COVID numbers Written by Geoffrey Plant on December 14, 2020
The Daily Press filed a legal complaint in Grant County’s Sixth Judicial District Court today seeking to compel Gila Regional Medical Center to comply with New Mexico’s Inspection of Public Records Act. The hospital has repeatedly refused to release information about the current occupancy of the hospital, how many of those patients suffer from COVID-19 and other anonymous statistics that the newspaper maintains are in the community interest during the most severe public health crisis the state has ever faced.
“Every week, I read up-to-date COVID hospital admissions statistics in other newspapers from around New Mexico, often paired with specific pleas from local hospital administrators related to how adherence to state public health orders would make their lives easier,” said Daily Press Publisher Nick Sei