Anonymous wrote:20:51, for a specially trained team like this, they are cross trained. No one will be at risk for catching Ebola if they have not been trained. The breakdown for a team like this is not the same as the hospital. Nurses and doctors take on multiple roles in order to decrease the number of people potentially exposed to the disease and to keep the risk of contamination lower. They likely won't have a clerk anywhere near the patient, and since this disease is not airborne, the clerk is at almost no risk (obviously as long as someone is there was an infectious disease the risk can't be zero). Yes, anyone who is uncomfortable with this very minimal risk can take sick days or leave, but most hospitals won't tolerate that.

Interesting -- thanks. I guess you are a hyper paranoid person, you probably aren't taking a desk clerk job in a hospital; I guess if you have such a job and are worried or not trusting Emory's precautions, you can quietly take some sick days but frankly who knows how many days the patient will need to be there.

21:04 -- I'm not asking out of panic, I am actually curious as to how these kinds of specialized teams work in a hospital since I am not in a healthcare related industry.

20:51, for a specially trained team like this, they are cross trained. No one will be at risk for catching Ebola if they have not been trained. The breakdown for a team like this is not the same as the hospital. Nurses and doctors take on multiple roles in order to decrease the number of people potentially exposed to the disease and to keep the risk of contamination lower. They likely won't have a clerk anywhere near the patient, and since this disease is not airborne, the clerk is at almost no risk (obviously as long as someone is there was an infectious disease the risk can't be zero). Yes, anyone who is uncomfortable with this very minimal risk can take sick days or leave, but most hospitals won't tolerate that.

This country is losing its mind. So is Israel, but that's for the political forum....

I confess I don't know much about this special training, bt most medical professionals do in fact have ethical obligations to treat the patient in front of them. You set the leg of the man who shoots the president. You save the life of the man who kills a cop. That's how it works. You don't get to just opt out.

If they have a special team, those people will work with this patient. If there is an outbreak in the US, the medical professionals in duty will treat them. Because that's what they've trained and studied to do.

Ever see the movie Outbreak?

Anonymous wrote:
There is no opting out, OP. This what they trained for.

It's as if an HIV researcher suddenly didn't want to touch the clinical samples. My friend's father once had a situation in his hospital ward - he was accidentally pricked by a contaminated needle. He was fine, as it turned out, but it was definitely a serious scare.

I get why you wouldn't opt out if you were on a special infectious disease team that has trained for this kind of event -- at the 11th hour, they can't just have people saying "oh I thought the training was cool but this is too risky for me." But I can't imagine everyone in the entire health system has this special training? My question was can you opt out if you are simply working triage or are a nurse or supply clerk or the 1000s of other jobs in the hospital. But the way they are locking this down, it seems like those other employees won't have to opt in or out because there may be a special team assigned to this unit -- none of the "oh the nurse manager put you on the schedule for Tuesday, so I guess you'll have to deal -- you'll be fine."

Anonymous wrote:Yikes! Scary. 90% death rate. They should just stay where they are.

Yes. I got this weird pit in my stomach when I read the story - like I was reading the beginning of something horrible. I could see if we had a treatment that could only be done here. But there is no treatment, there is no vaccine. Why risk infecting so many new people (the plane, getting them off the plane, people at the hospital). All it takes is one hospital worker to bring it home and we have an epidemic here.

There is no opting out, OP. This what they trained for.

It's as if an HIV researcher suddenly didn't want to touch the clinical samples. My friend's father once had a situation in his hospital ward - he was accidentally pricked by a contaminated needle. He was fine, as it turned out, but it was definitely a serious scare.

Anonymous wrote:I just read this article: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/americans-ebola-flown-back-us/story?id=24799794

"Emory University Hospital has a specially built isolation unit set up in collaboration with the CDC to treat patients who are exposed to certain serious infectious diseases," hospital officials said. "It is physically separate from other patient areas and has unique equipment and infrastructure that provide an extraordinarily high level of clinical isolation. It is one of only four such facilities in the country."

"Emory University Hospital physicians, nurses and staff are highly trained in the specific and unique protocols and procedures necessary to treat and care for this type of patient. For this specially trained staff, these procedures are practiced on a regular basis throughout the year so we are fully prepared for this type of situation."

It sounds like there is no opting out, except for maybe folks with significant health concerns, but it also sounds like this is what they're trained for.

It kind of sounds like one segment of the staff is trained for this, as opposed to all ICU staff. I think the time to opt out would have been when you were being selected for this special team. Given that your hospital is in Atlanta, as is the CDC, you had to have imagined that sometime in your career you'd have to deal with something like this if you were on the special team. Sounds like everyone/everything will be kept separate and apart so Joe Schome who is in charge of stocking the supply closets with IVs/saline won't have to be wandering up to this unit in order to hold on to his job.

Basically what PP said. The people who will be dealing with this patient are highly trained to work with a situation like this. No opting out but likely they agree to do the special training regarding certain infectious diseases.

Why exactly are we bringing people with Ebola into the country? For containment purposes, doesn't it make more sense to treat them in the country of origin irrespective of the citizenship of the patient? Transcontinental transport of people with a disease as infectious and as serious as ebola seems risky--despite infectious disease protocols.

Yikes! Scary. 90% death rate. They should just stay where they are.

This sounds like when AIDS was first diagnosed. Some medical professionals and staff didn't want to have anything to do with those who had it.

I just read this article: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/americans-ebola-flown-back-us/story?id=24799794

"Emory University Hospital has a specially built isolation unit set up in collaboration with the CDC to treat patients who are exposed to certain serious infectious diseases," hospital officials said. "It is physically separate from other patient areas and has unique equipment and infrastructure that provide an extraordinarily high level of clinical isolation. It is one of only four such facilities in the country."

"Emory University Hospital physicians, nurses and staff are highly trained in the specific and unique protocols and procedures necessary to treat and care for this type of patient. For this specially trained staff, these procedures are practiced on a regular basis throughout the year so we are fully prepared for this type of situation."

It sounds like there is no opting out, except for maybe folks with significant health concerns, but it also sounds like this is what they're trained for.

How does that work? The person will obviously come into ICU, and they've said it'll be a special section/ward. Say you're an ICU nurse or even a triage person, desk clerk, or working in Emory's labs, x-ray etc. and you want nothing to do with this. Do you have a choice or is it just kind of like -- sorry you're staffed to work radiology (or whatever) on Tuesday so if that unit calls, you'll have to don your protective suit to go do the x-rays? I'm sure attendings will get a choice in this matter, as Emory doesn't want bad press -- but what if you're one of the other million people working in the hospital?