Healthcare Management major Courtney Maness began working at FirstHealth of the Carolinas in Pinehurst, NC, three years ago. Until recently, Maness worked mostly with registration and insurance verification, coordinating referrals between a family medicine clinic and an offsite referral center. She never expected to work at a COVID-19 test site. Read her experience in her own words below:
As I am sure most are aware, COVID-19 was not something we necessarily planned for or expected. When the administrators of FirstHealth first saw the effect the virus may have on the community, they began to devise a plan on how to best care for patients and keep staff protected. One of the outcomes of this plan was strategically placing COVID-19 test sites around the community.
It was at this point that they began asking for employee volunteers to work the drive-thru test site. My regional manager contacted me about volunteering and it didn’t take long before I knew I wanted to step up and help out. I wanted to do whatever I could to help my fellow coworkers and our community. I was no longer watching the effects of a global pandemic, I was watching the effect locally and I was experiencing them personally.
At the testing site, FirstHealth provides us all with masks, goggles, face shields, surgical caps, isolation gowns, gloves, paperwork and transportable computers (for ordering lab work, verifying demographic information and ensuring correct primary provider information for result purposes).
When a vehicle arrives at the test site, it is my responsibility to request the patient not get out of their car, hand them a mask, and check their temperature and pulse oximetry. I then proceed with a series of required registration questions. I ask them their name, date of birth, address, telephone numbers, symptoms, who their primary care physician is and if they have traveled anywhere within the last two weeks or may have had contact with another person with COVID-19. The patient signs three documents, verifying that the information I have recorded is correct, giving consent to test and acknowledging that the information will be reported to the Health Department. After obtaining all the data I need, I enter everything into their hospital account while a licensed CMA, LPN, or RN swabs the patient for COVID-19. Once this is all completed, our extraordinary provider speaks with the patient and explains self isolation, when to expect results and what to do next.
Some days we are working in 40 degree weather, trying to get as much warmth as we can from portable heaters. Other days we are working in 80 degree weather, peeling our PPE equipment off our skin at the end of the day. That being said, I haven’t heard a single negative attitude or a single complaint from any employee or patient that has visited our test site. This is community, and it has been truly eye opening. I have learned so much about healthcare, safety, COVID-19 and more. If you take anything from this, I hope it will be to continue social distancing, wash your hands and to thank your healthcare workers and community members. We are all in this together, and through this joint effort we will come out stronger and more equipped for events in the future. Roll Humps!
Courtney Maness