Nursing and the Ebola Virus

[0.adamantite]

For those of us in unaffected countries, are you concerned about the ebola virus spreading? Would you care for ebola patients? I live in an area with a very high density of African immigrants and come into contact with these individuals regularly. We have a lot of African immigrants who bring back tuberculosis from their home countries and at my unit we end up caring for them. We take care of a lot of rare infectious diseases. I was reading an article and it dawned on me how plausible it would be for me to encounter this virus. And I admit, it's terrifying and I might refuse that assignment. Many healthcare workers in Africa are dying because of caring for the ill.

[Sippie]

Sad about the nurse who is now ill. Prayers to her and her family. CDC is saying there was some apparent breach in the 'protocol'. It will be interesting to see what exactly happened.

It does seem like a lot of healthcare workers are catching ebola even though they are wearing protective gear and taking precautions. In Africa, maybe they didn't have all the stuff they needed and had to clean and re use things quite a bit which I could see leading to accidents. Here in the U.S. they should have appropriate gear that was hopefully disposable and being incinerated.

[ktwlpn, LPN]

In the field they "buddy up " and decon with bleach prior to removing the PPE.Not enough staff for that in an American hospital.

[SandyB]

In the field they "buddy up " and decon with bleach prior to removing the PPE.Not enough staff for that in an American hospital.

And that needs to change right away!

[sistrmoon, BSN, RN]

How predictable that health officials are now saying "there must have been a breach in protocol." Are these healthcare workers being forced to make vague statements about what they "might" have done that broke protocol to calm the panic? I'm getting a sinking feeling that my coworkers and I(and by extension our families) will be treated as expendable if this becomes a crisis. Just do contact precautions, that's all that's required. Spacesuits are expensive. And all the while the public will just think we can't manage to not contaminate ourselves so oh well.

[dudette10, MSN, RN]

Would it make any sense to take off the super contaminated gloves, put on new gloves to take off the rest of the PPE, then remove those gloves? If nothing else, maybe it'll decrease the risk of transmission... Just an idea

While the thumb hooks and ill-fitting sleeves go flapping around.

The standard PPE is looking worse and worse as...well...PPE.

[dudette10, MSN, RN]

Now a Texas nurse apparently has Ebola from taking care of Duncan. This is getting scarier and sadder, hope she makes it! Are they going to decontaminate her house, quarantine her family, what if there are any pets. What an invasion of privacy to have strangers in your house cleaning it. That's what they did in Texas and in Spain and even the poor woman's dog was euthanized.

Nothing has been said about Ebola and what protections if any the hospital would provide where I work. All we have our cheap isolation gowns, shoe protectors that don't even fit my shoes, lol and TB masks. We don't have plastic face masks, only goggles if you can get them from central supply.

And they will have hazmat suits to clean an empty home, but HCWs caring for infected patients wear one-size-fits-all gowns that don't cover your calves or back. Nice.

[SandyB]

Ebola Outbreak | FRONTLINE | PBS awesome documentary and you get to see how they take off the PPE...the doc DOES use bleach ON the GLOVE.

Watch for it.

A tear jerker too by the way so be aware, it's hard to watch.

[TC3200]

And they will have hazmat suits to clean an empty home, but HCWs caring for infected patients wear one-size-fits-all gowns that don't cover your calves or back. Nice.

That's what I said in R.N. school back in 2011, and that was before ebola, even: The personnel protection available in the average hospital is not worth squat. And the mythical powers of hand-washing are highly overrated. And hospital administrators, if they are just bean counters and business degrees, are NOT the people to be making decisions about how to run hospitals now.

[dnnc52]

Lysol claims to kill 99.9% bacteria and viruses wonder if Ebola is that 0.1%?

[dnnc52]

Good Point made by TC3200

[stablesystole]

If ebola spreads into the region I am going on hiatus. The ugly truth is that ebola kills healthcare workers. I don't see myself as being under obligation to die for my profession.

[jmh77]

Could all the Ebola threads be consolidated? Now that a Dallas RN has contracted it from a patient, it would be easier to follow. Many questions to be asked and answered as it relates to our practice.