Pen Bay Medical Center
Living Our Values
Individuals and organizations thrive in challenging times when they hold true to their core values. This was certainly the case at PBMC and WCGH this year. Following are four stories of care teams that relied on our core values to ensure that we could serve our communities during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Innovation
When COVID-19 emerged, we quickly recognized the need to create a number of negative pressure rooms to care for COVID-19 patients. These rooms exhaust air to the outside, preventing contaminated air from flowing back into the hospital where it could infect other patients and care team members.
This would be no easy task. Negative pressure rooms typically are installed during a building’s initial construction or during a major renovation. The operations and maintenance teams at PBMC and WCGH would have to create them on the fly.
And that’s just what they did. Thinking outside the box, they developed a design that took advantage of readily available materials like plywood, 10-inch flexible duct and large exterior ventilation fans with HEPA filters.
Then the teams went to work. In a matter of days, they managed to fit plywood panels into window openings in each room and run the 10-inch duct through the panels to the ventilation units outside. Since then, the maintenance teams have used airflow gages each day to confirm that the system is working properly.
“Innovative thinking is a hallmark of our maintenance departments,” said Mike Rich, senior director of operations at PBMC. “In this case, their efforts allowed us to care for our community’s COVID patients safely. We couldn’t have done it without them.”
Ownership
If ownership is about seeing something that needs to be done and taking responsibility for it, then the members of the Float Pool are shining examples of this core value.
The Float Pool was set up as a way to quickly move care team members to where they were needed most as PBMC and WCGH responded to the rapidly evolving pandemic. The pool consisted mainly of those who had been furloughed with pay after the hospitals suspended non-critical visits. A team of schedulers matched those in the pool with the heightened needs of various departments around the hospital.
In many cases, care team members ended up in new departments, with different responsibilities and new colleagues. Hannah Parenteau, RN, BSN, normally worked with patients at the Stockton Springs Regional Health Center. When the health center temporarily shut down during the early days of the pandemic, the Float Pool schedulers assigned Hannah to the Respiratory Health Center, the COVID testing site at WCGH.
“Some people have asked me what it’s been like to leave the relatively safe environment of the regional health center to work on the ‘frontline’ with COVID patients,” Hannah says. “My response is that we are always frontline workers. We are always at a higher risk, no matter what we are dealing with, whether it’s coronavirus or the flu. So when I was asked to work in the Respiratory Health Center, I saw a need and said yes. It’s all about taking care of people, whether it is coronavirus or a broken leg or whatever the case may be.”
Excellence
Sometimes you pursue excellence for the sake of others. Sometimes you pursue it out of necessity. For the teams who set up and staffed the COVID-19 testing centers at PBMC and WCGH, it was a lot of both.
The testing centers – called the Acute Respiratory Center at PBMC and the Respiratory Health Center at WCGH – were set up early during the pandemic when it became clear that COVID-19 testing would need to be done in stand-alone facilities to prevent contaminating other parts of the hospital.
Leading this effort was Kendra Emery, DO, at PBMC and Heather Ward, MD, at WCGH. They and their teams redesigned a building at each hospital and established policies and procedures to ensure the safety of patients – and of themselves.
“These teams had to be at their very best every minute of every day,” says Dr. Emery, a family medicine practitioner and the community health medical director at PBMC. “Thanks to their pursuit of excellence, we tested hundreds of patients safely and continue to help our community through this pandemic.”
Says Dr. Ward, a family medicine practitioner at WCGH: “In a sense, because our teams have always pursued excellence, this core value was already a part of who they are and was a strong foundation for them to build on at the respiratory clinics.”
Helping Our Neighbors
Challenging times often bring out the best in people. It certainly did for eight WCGH care team members who stepped out of their normal roles at the hospital to help at a local long-term care facility struggling with a COVID-19 outbreak.
Tall Pines, an independent long-term care facility just around the corner from WCGH, recorded 43 cases of COVID-19 over three and a half weeks in April, with 32 residents and 11 staff testing positive. Recognizing the challenge before them, the Tall Pines administration reached out to WCGH for help.
“Initially, we were able to support Tall Pines with guidance, food, personal protective equipment and medical supplies,” says Rob Fowler, RN, BSN, vice president of quality for PBMC and WCGH. “But as COVID-19 spread in their facility, the strain on their staff grew to the point that they needed help caring for their residents.”
Fowler sent an email to all care team members asking for volunteers to go to Tall Pines. With a few exceptions, those who accepted would temporarily leave their existing role at the hospital and become employees of Tall Pines. “We knew this would be a big ask of our care team members, especially since Tall Pines isn’t affiliated with MaineHealth,” Fowler says. “But the residents of Tall Pines are members of our community, and we were committed to caring for them. We were so proud when eight care team members stepped up.”
Elida Dickey, MA, who normally works in the primary care practice at WCGH, was one of the first to volunteer. “When I read email asking for volunteers, I asked myself, ‘Who would be crazy enough to actually volunteer to be around COVID-19,” Dickey says. “But that night I kept thinking about the Tall Pines staff working through the pandemic with little or no resources. I thought about all the Tall Pines patients who were probably scared and isolated from their families. I thought about my own grandparents, and knew I had to do this.”
Dickey found the assignment physically challenging. She had to wear a full set of personal protective equipment (PPE) throughout her shift, including N95 mask, plastic shield, gloves and gown. The mask left her nose and cheek raw and chapped. But that wasn’t the hard part. “I didn’t expect it to take as much of an emotional toll as it did,” Elida says. “It was heartbreaking to work with residents who were scared and isolated from friends and family because visitations had been suspended.”
Heather Ward, MD, a family practice provider at WCGH, also stepped forward to assist Tall Pines. It wasn’t her first introduction to COVID-19. Dr. Ward and a group of care team members had already set up the COVID-19 testing clinic at WCGH and had been testing symptomatic patients for several weeks.
“I worked with leadership at Tall Pines to develop plans for implementing COVID guidelines established by the Centers for Disease Control,” says Dr. Ward, who split her time between Tall Pines and the WCGH COVID testing site. “We also developed policies and procedures around PPE, how to put it on and take it off safely.”
Dr. Ward also arranged for counselors to be available to Tall Pines employees. “It was really hard for them,” she says. “They love those patients. They’ve been caring for some of them for more than 10 years.”
Hannah Parenteau, RN, BSN, who normally works in the Stockton Springs Regional Health Center, volunteered to help at Tall Pines after conversations with her husband and children. “We all knew I would be around COVID-19 patients on a daily basis, and I needed to know that they would be comfortable with that,” Hannah says.
Asked why she volunteered, Hannah’s response exemplified the spirit of not just those who volunteered to work at Tall Pines but every WCGH care team member who serves our community.
“When I joined the National Guard, I raised my hand and pledged to defend my country,” Hannah says. “As a nurse, I’m just as committed to defending my community. It’s what all of us signed up for and it’s what makes being a part of WCGH so rewarding.”
Coastal Healthcare Alliance | marketing@pbmc.org | pbmc.org | wcgh.org
Waldo County General Hospital
Innovation
When COVID-19 emerged, we quickly recognized the need to create a number of negative pressure rooms to care for COVID-19 patients. These rooms exhaust air to the outside, preventing contaminated air from flowing back into the hospital where it could infect other patients and care team members.
This would be no easy task. Negative pressure rooms typically are installed during a building’s initial construction or during a major renovation. The operations and maintenance teams at PBMC and WCGH would have to create them on the fly.
And that’s just what they did. Thinking outside the box, they developed a design that took advantage of readily available materials like plywood, 10-inch flexible duct and large exterior ventilation fans with HEPA filters.
Then the teams went to work. In a matter of days, they managed to fit plywood panels into window openings in each room and run the 10-inch duct through the panels to the ventilation units outside. Since then, the maintenance teams have used airflow gages each day to confirm that the system is working properly.
“Innovative thinking is a hallmark of our maintenance departments,” said Mike Rich, senior director of operations at PBMC. “In this case, their efforts allowed us to care for our community’s COVID patients safely. We couldn’t have done it without them.”
Ownership
If ownership is about seeing something that needs to be done and taking responsibility for it, then the members of the Float Pool are shining examples of this core value.
The Float Pool was set up as a way to quickly move care team members to where they were needed most as PBMC and WCGH responded to the rapidly evolving pandemic. The pool consisted mainly of those who had been furloughed with pay after the hospitals suspended non-critical visits. A team of schedulers matched those in the pool with the heightened needs of various departments around the hospital.
In many cases, care team members ended up in new departments, with different responsibilities and new colleagues. Hannah Parenteau, RN, BSN, normally worked with patients at the Stockton Springs Regional Health Center. When the health center temporarily shut down during the early days of the pandemic, the Float Pool schedulers assigned Hannah to the Respiratory Health Center, the COVID testing site at WCGH.
“Some people have asked me what it’s been like to leave the relatively safe environment of the regional health center to work on the ‘frontline’ with COVID patients,” Hannah says. “My response is that we are always frontline workers. We are always at a higher risk, no matter what we are dealing with, whether it’s coronavirus or the flu. So when I was asked to work in the Respiratory Health Center, I saw a need and said yes. It’s all about taking care of people, whether it is coronavirus or a broken leg or whatever the case may be.”
Excellence
Sometimes you pursue excellence for the sake of others. Sometimes you pursue it out of necessity. For the teams who set up and staffed the COVID-19 testing centers at PBMC and WCGH, it was a lot of both.
The testing centers – called the Acute Respiratory Center at PBMC and the Respiratory Health Center at WCGH – were set up early during the pandemic when it became clear that COVID-19 testing would need to be done in stand-alone facilities to prevent contaminating other parts of the hospital.
Leading this effort was Kendra Emery, DO, at PBMC and Heather Ward, MD, at WCGH. They and their teams redesigned a building at each hospital and established policies and procedures to ensure the safety of patients – and of themselves.
“These teams had to be at their very best every minute of every day,” says Dr. Emery, a family medicine practitioner and the community health medical director at PBMC. “Thanks to their pursuit of excellence, we tested hundreds of patients safely and continue to help our community through this pandemic.”
Says Dr. Ward, a family medicine practitioner at WCGH: “In a sense, because our teams have always pursued excellence, this core value was already a part of who they are and was a strong foundation for them to build on at the respiratory clinics.”
Helping Our Neighbors
Challenging times often bring out the best in people. It certainly did for eight WCGH care team members who stepped out of their normal roles at the hospital to help at a local long-term care facility struggling with a COVID-19 outbreak.
Tall Pines, an independent long-term care facility just around the corner from WCGH, recorded 43 cases of COVID-19 over three and a half weeks in April, with 32 residents and 11 staff testing positive. Recognizing the challenge before them, the Tall Pines administration reached out to WCGH for help.
“Initially, we were able to support Tall Pines with guidance, food, personal protective equipment and medical supplies,” says Rob Fowler, RN, BSN, vice president of quality for PBMC and WCGH. “But as COVID-19 spread in their facility, the strain on their staff grew to the point that they needed help caring for their residents.”
Fowler sent an email to all care team members asking for volunteers to go to Tall Pines. With a few exceptions, those who accepted would temporarily leave their existing role at the hospital and become employees of Tall Pines. “We knew this would be a big ask of our care team members, especially since Tall Pines isn’t affiliated with MaineHealth,” Fowler says. “But the residents of Tall Pines are members of our community, and we were committed to caring for them. We were so proud when eight care team members stepped up.”
Elida Dickey, MA, who normally works in the primary care practice at WCGH, was one of the first to volunteer. “When I read email asking for volunteers, I asked myself, ‘Who would be crazy enough to actually volunteer to be around COVID-19,” Dickey says. “But that night I kept thinking about the Tall Pines staff working through the pandemic with little or no resources. I thought about all the Tall Pines patients who were probably scared and isolated from their families. I thought about my own grandparents, and knew I had to do this.”
Dickey found the assignment physically challenging. She had to wear a full set of personal protective equipment (PPE) throughout her shift, including N95 mask, plastic shield, gloves and gown. The mask left her nose and cheek raw and chapped. But that wasn’t the hard part. “I didn’t expect it to take as much of an emotional toll as it did,” Elida says. “It was heartbreaking to work with residents who were scared and isolated from friends and family because visitations had been suspended.”
Heather Ward, MD, a family practice provider at WCGH, also stepped forward to assist Tall Pines. It wasn’t her first introduction to COVID-19. Dr. Ward and a group of care team members had already set up the COVID-19 testing clinic at WCGH and had been testing symptomatic patients for several weeks.
“I worked with leadership at Tall Pines to develop plans for implementing COVID guidelines established by the Centers for Disease Control,” says Dr. Ward, who split her time between Tall Pines and the WCGH COVID testing site. “We also developed policies and procedures around PPE, how to put it on and take it off safely.”
Dr. Ward also arranged for counselors to be available to Tall Pines employees. “It was really hard for them,” she says. “They love those patients. They’ve been caring for some of them for more than 10 years.”
Hannah Parenteau, RN, BSN, who normally works in the Stockton Springs Regional Health Center, volunteered to help at Tall Pines after conversations with her husband and children. “We all knew I would be around COVID-19 patients on a daily basis, and I needed to know that they would be comfortable with that,” Hannah says.
Asked why she volunteered, Hannah’s response exemplified the spirit of not just those who volunteered to work at Tall Pines but every WCGH care team member who serves our community.
“When I joined the National Guard, I raised my hand and pledged to defend my country,” Hannah says. “As a nurse, I’m just as committed to defending my community. It’s what all of us signed up for and it’s what makes being a part of WCGH so rewarding.”