Sandy Thurmond ’84, our 2019 Distinguished Alumna and a member of our Board of Trustees, is working hard to keep others healthy during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Thurmond shared with us how her daily work at Children’s of Alabama has changed and how the hospital is responding to the pandemic.

“Similar to other hospitals, Children’s of Alabama implemented a density reduction plan, sending staff members not essential to patient care and daily operations home. Additionally, our campus is locked down with everyone who enters being screened for possible fever and respiratory symptoms prior to being allowed to enter. Our Visitor policy has been tightened and all elective surgeries and specialty care visits have been postponed.

Our primary care practices, which are under my purview, are all open and seeing both well and sick patients – which is complicated at best. Many practices have been able to move their sick care outside the building which means that the patient and parent do not have to be masked, saving our precious PPE (personal protection equipment) and keeping the germs out of the offices. Payors have made exceptions for certain visits to be able to occur by telephone or video, thus helping to keep the lesser sick patients out of the offices.

As possible, the well patients are being separated from the sick patients, with well patients seen in the mornings and sick patients in the afternoon. Staff providing care, as well as the space in which care is provided, are kept separated as well.  A healthy child receiving immunizations is seen for seven visits in his or her first wo years. Older children also receive shots periodically. The CDC, Alabama Department of Public Health, and the American Academy of Pediatrics all advise that these well visits with immunizations still occur.

My days used to include a lot of time out and about at the practices, but now I am in my office downtown in socially distanced or Zoom meetings and processing large amounts of COVID-19 information. These are unprecedented times, and we have changed workflows and processes, but we have also remained focused on caring for Alabama’s sick and injured children, as well as its well children – while keeping in mind the health and safety of all our patients and staff.  Social distancing saves lives – stay home if you can, stay six feet away from others, wash your hands frequently, and stay safe.”

Read more about Thurmond in our ’Southern magazine feature here.