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 Charlene Gettings, PA(ASCP)CM
AAPA member since 2010
“My experience with the COVID-19 pandemic comes from the perspective of a laboratory manager at an academic hospital in Chicago. Our Hospital Incident Command System (HICS) was activated in mid-January. Part of that activation included establishing a resource center on our internal intranet page wherein all our COVID-19 communications are consolidated. This was extremely helpful since the HICS Update emails increased from a few sent sporadically in early March to multiple e-mails sent daily by mid-March. This was an overwhelming situation that left little time to digest the disseminated message and factually explain the practicalities and impact to our laboratories’ personnel.
By mid-March, our workload census decreased dramatically because of cancellations of elective procedures and the postponement of cancer surgeries. Meanwhile, we implemented a number of ‘low census’ activities such as SOP revisions and creations, cross training, completion of competency assessments, updating training materials, organizing and cleaning all workspaces, scanning a backlog of paperwork, organizing files on the shared drives, organizing legal specimen storage, filing of slides and blocks, slide send-backs, CAP preparation, providing support to the microbiology lab (in-house testing for COVID-19), etc. We were still ‘essential’ employees coming to work each day to follow our usual schedules while waiting for other areas of the hospital to stabilize as the decreased census had a domino effect and didn’t halt all areas at once. However, the dictate to social distance and work from home recommendations issued by the HICS Updates, combined with the Governor of Illinois’ declaration to ‘shelter in place’ on March 20th took a final toll on staff. Tensions ran high in the labs until we implemented our rotating ‘reserve’ schedules.
Aside from my daily responsibilities as a manager, and although COVID-19 activities took on a major focus, there were many other pressing tasks that needed my attention. In early February to mid-March, a local Teamsters election took place involving laboratory staff and other ‘technical’ positions across the hospital with the outcome of the vote having a direct impact on my area. The end of February and early March included preparation for the annual USCAP meeting and exhibiting at the AAPA booth. As the climate of the COVID crisis evolved, I had to tell PAs that they could no longer attend the AAPA Spring Meeting. As an AAPA volunteer and member of the BOT, this was not an easy task that also needed attention. However, my most overwhelming responsibility was the completion and relocation of our entire morgue and autopsy operations to a newly reconstructed space, a project that was over a year in the making. (Read More)“
We want to hear from you! During this time of isolation, now more than ever we need to see and hear from our PA community! How is COVID-19 affecting your work? What tips and tricks have you found useful? How are you using this time to promote pathologists’ assistants? Send us a summary describing your “new normal”, along with one or two high-resolution photos, and your story may be featured next (read previous features here). Or, if you have any COVID-19 resources to add to our list, please pass them along. Remember, we are all in this together, and the AAPA will be here to support you throughout this crisis and beyond.
Would you like to be featured in ASCP BOC’s new campaign? As a tie in with Lab Week, the ASCP BOC is seeking to honor the heroic efforts of laboratory professionals from around the world who are engaged in the fight against COVID-19. They are asking for pictures, stories, and/or videos that can be shared on their social media channels throughout this crisis. Click here to learn more; submit your story to [email protected].
Submission guidelines: There are no strict submission guidelines or criteria (submissions can be about anything people are doing to combat COVID-19). But some examples of what you could send are: how laboratory workers are keeping themselves safe, how they are encouraging good hygiene and hand washing, how they are using humor to relieve stress, how they are raising awareness of the medical laboratory profession in the midst of this pandemic, etc.
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