Pandemic brought more collaboration, telehealth and patient education

Hospitals found a few silver linings during a global pandemic that cost them millions of dollars, inundated their emergency rooms, and stretched staff to their limits. Revolutionizing the way medical providers think about healthcare may be one of them.

Matthew Gibb, chief clinical officer at Concord Hospital, said that during the last year, necessity drove hospitals to rapidly innovate to adapt to the coronavirus.

“I think healthcare is going to change permanently in a good way, in many ways because of Covid,” he said.

In addition to quickly setting up telehealth services that hospital administrators hope will outlast the pandemic, he said the emergency brought together groups that had previously been operating in parallel.

“We had teams that were in silos, that all of a sudden were forced to work together to figure out a workflow that was collaborative and less geographically focused,” he said.

Concord Hospital built relationships with state health agencies and other hospitals to strategize their response to the pandemic. He said those inroads have made tackling other statewide issues, like the behavioral health crisis, a collaborative effort rather than a problem that each organization addressed separately.

Gibb said it’s not just hospitals that have changed their outlook on providing care — patients have also adjusted the ways in which they seek care.

Because patients were hesitant to go into the hospital during the height of the pandemic, he said many have learned to better assess when they don’t need medical attention.

“Patients now know that many things get better in five days on their own,” Gibb said. “You don’t run into urgent care on day one.”

Returning to normal

As daily new Covid-19 cases drop and vaccination rates rise, many parts of life have started to resemble what they looked like pre-pandemic. This has be come even more true since the CDC released guidance that dramatically relaxed mask-wearing recommendations.

Healthcare providers like Concord Hospital, however, are on a different timeline.

Some of the hospital’s centers, like the Day Surgery Center and Ambulatory Care Center, are not allowing visitors, while others have opened their doors to guests with restrictions on the number of people.

Masks are still required for all visitors, vaccinated and unvaccinated alike.

“The recent CDC changes are being still being digested by us,” said Gibb. “I think healthcare probably will be conservative for a while just because this is where sick Covid patients land.”

He said he expects visitation policies will loosen over the summer and patients can expect mask policies to change in the next two months.

Pamela Puleo, the chief advancement officer at Concord Hospital, said a special committee meets weekly to discuss the risks and benefits of loosening restrictions.

“Little by little, we’re opening up and trying to get back to normal and at the same time make sure that patients are getting their needs met,” she said.

Puleo said the hospital has already brought back some vaccinated volunteers to support patients who aren’t able to see all of their family members right now.

Staffing needs

New Hampshire’s nurse shortage was one of many longstanding issues exacerbated by the pandemic.

In addition to many seasoned nurses leaving the field, the supply of new nurses stalled during the pandemic, making the state’s shortage even more dire. Gibb said nurse training, which involves clinical rotations, was delayed while New Hampshire hospitals treated Covid-19 patients.

Concord Hospital is not yet facing a shortage of staff that affects patient care, according to Robert Steigmeyer, the hospital’s president and CEO, who said the facilities are able to meet demand with the current number of employees.

“We’re mostly concerned about the growth that’s in front of us and being able to recruit nurses,” he said.

The hospital has tried to keep their salaries and benefits competitive to attract workers, but addressing the shortage might require less conventional thinking, Gibb said.

Steigmeyer said the hospital is interested in partnering with programs that train nurses, like nursing internship programs and community colleges, to ensure there is a regular source of trained staff. Gibb said providers may also have to broaden the responsibilities of technicians and ancillary staff with appropriate training and supervision to make the healthcare industry less reliant on a waning workforce.

“We have to think differently to attract the workforce to New Hampshire,” he said.

This article is being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.

Partnerships between hospitals and state health agencies built during the pandemic have laid the groundwork to tackle other statewide issues like the behaviorial health crisis.