Article originally published in the Philadelphia Business Journal on October 20, 2014
On Oct. 19, those individuals who had contact with Ebola victim Thomas Duncan completed their 21-day self-monitoring period. Duncan’s family and fiancé, who were in very close proximity with Duncan, have also ended their 21-day quarantine. No one has shown any indication of illness. This may lead to more rational and less extreme behavior by the public in dealing with the risks of exposure to Ebola.
I believe that the events of the past three weeks point to three mission critical imperatives in dealing with Ebola:
Hospitals need to step up their game.
Hospitals need to step up their game a number of levels. They need to be ahead of what may come at them by adopting the right protocols, training and equipment, to safely deal with this disease. Barclay Berdan, the CEO of Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital’s parent company Texas Health Resources, publicly apologized for the errors that occurred in a letter published in the local news media. He acknowledged that Ebola training had not yet been fully implemented at the time of Duncan’s emergency room visit, and therefore the hospital was not yet prepared to handle Ebola patients. Accusations were made by the nursing staff that they were not sufficiently trained to care for Ebola patients, they had insufficient protective suits and that their concerns were ignored by hospital administrators.
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