The student newspaper of Bucks County Community College

The Centurion

The student newspaper of Bucks County Community College

The Centurion

The student newspaper of Bucks County Community College

The Centurion

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Bucks Donates Medical Equipment to Local Hospitals

Photo courtesy of bucks.edu.
Photo courtesy of bucks.edu.

Bucks donated spare personal protective equipment (PPE) to St. Mary Medical Center in Langhorne and Aria Torresdale Hospital in Philadelphia to help combat shortages due to the coronavirus.

The recent coronavirus pandemic has caused hospitals in the area to become overcrowded. Medical supplies are running low and local healthcare workers are unsure when new supplies will be restocked.

Constance Corrigan, RN Ed.D. dean of the Health Sciences Department at Bucks decided to donate the college’s extra gear to the local hospitals due to the extremely low supply of PPE.

Corrigan said, “Given the severity of the situation, we decided to donate any extra supplies we had to help out some of our clinical affiliates,”

Jean Dolan, the Assistant Director of Public Relations at Bucks wrote an article naming all the supplies that were donated.

The supplies that were donated consisted of, “more than 50 boxes of gloves, 120 surgical masks, 20 Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) sets, 40 masks with shields, ten N95 masks, 25 sterile gown packs, 40 pairs of shoe covers, 100 bouffant caps, and 25 isolation gowns.”

Meghan Hammond is a Radiology Tech at Aria Torresdale Hospital said the medical equipment at the hospital is getting scarce.

Hammond said, “The donation to this hospital is absolutely amazing, and we are extremely grateful. The supplies at Torresdale are running low and we have to keep the same N95 mask for at least a week unless visibly soiled. We are running low on shielded masks and even gowns. The hospital is handing out masks as we enter the hospital, but it is extremely hard to get the proper PPE when entering patient rooms.”

Megan Conwell is a radiology tech at Upper Bucks Orthopedics, an affiliate of Grand View Hospital. Conwell said she is forced to wear the same masks until the elastic band is completely stretched out.

Conwell said, “I wear the same mask all day every day, we only get a new mask if the mask is ruined or if the ear loops are stretched out too far. There are Not enough masks for everyone to have a new one every day. Hand sanitizer, soap, and hospital-grade cleaning wipes running low and I am unsure when we will be able to even order more.”

Because of the National shortage of PPE, the CDC has released guidelines and strategies on how healthcare workers can optimize and extend the use of facemasks.

“The facemask should (only) be removed and discarded if soiled, damaged, or hard to breathe through,” says the CDC.

In most cases, health care workers wear the same mask for more than a week. Sanitation of the masks is questionable. The CDC guidelines are not in favor of the healthcare workers well-being.

The FDA has teamed up with multiple manufacturers to help solve the PPE shortage.

“The FDA is collaborating with manufacturers of personal protective equipment (PPE) to help facilitate mitigation strategies related to the COVID-19 outbreak. The FDA’s door is open, and we are available to collaborate with stakeholders,” says the FDA.