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Health Care May Be The Best Place To Start Working For Normalcy

Gov. Andrew Cuomo earlier this week gave some New York hospitals approval to begin allowing elective surgeries now that the first wave of COVID-19 infections has passed.

Using the word elective, however, sends the message that hospitals should be filling appointment books with cosmetic surgeries. Perhaps a better term is the one used earlier this week by Dr. Donald Yealey, UPMC Emergency Medicine Department chairman, when he said UPMC officials want to begin scheduling more essential health care.

“The most frequent contact I get as a health care provider is patients wanting needed care and wanting to schedule it but being unable to have that occur,” Yealey said. “We want to serve any patient who needs essential care. They can and they will receive it safely here at UPMC whether that be through video visits or in-person.”

Not only is scheduling essential health care visits helpful to hospitals’ bottom lines, it is critically important for those with medical conditions that require regular care, such as cancer patients, those with heart conditions, diabetes patients or even preventative screenings such as mammograms or colonoscopies. Getting essential care up and running again will promote healthier residents here in Chautauqua County, and perhaps those who have been putting off care because they didn’t want to overburden the health care system here should consider having their ailments examined, too. The last thing anyone wants are additional deaths because people were afraid to call the hospital over fear that they wouldn’t be treated because of COVID-19.

There is one additional benefit to society of resuming essential care. UPMC is going to begin testing those who visit its hospitals for COVID-19 antibodies and share that information with state, local and federal officials. Such testing is an essential part of getting our society back up and running.

Hospitals and doctors will, of course, do everything in their power to make sure services are provided as safely as possible for practitioners and for patients, and they are waiting on guidance from the New York State Health Department to learn more about the types of cases that can be scheduled. Some patients will likely be hearing from health care providers, but patients with questions should contact their physician to see what types of care is able to be provided as well as how that care will be handled in our new COVID-19 world.

The conversations over reopening business are necessary ones to have, but health care is perhaps the best place to start returning to a sense of normalcy.

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