Ebola Advice From Atlanta and Nebraska Doctors Fails to Ease Fears

EMORY AND NEBRASKA UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTERS SHARE DETAILS OF THEIR PROCEDURES WITH OTHER HOSPITALS

TIME MAGAZINE                                                                     Oct. 14, 2014

By Alexandra Sifferlin

Physicians who are treating patients with the Ebola virus at Emory University Hospital and the University of Nebraska Medical Center shared their advice and protocols with worried hospitals and health care providers over a phone conference on Tuesday. Whether the conference really quelled these fears, however, was not exactly clear.

The intent of the conference, which was organized by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), was to answer health care questions related to admitting and treating a patient with Ebola. There’s growing concern among health officials that hospitals without specialized isolation units and with little experience treating serious communicable diseases may not be fully prepared to treat the disease....

Emory University Hospital in Atlanta, seen in August 2014. Jessica McGowan—Getty Images

“Every clinic in the United States needs to be prepared to manage a patient who has just returned from an Ebola-affected country and has fever,” said Dr. Alexander Isakov, the director of prehospital and disaster medicine at Emory...

Emory...has successfully treated missionaries Dr. Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol, and is currently treating an unnamed patient. No one on their medical team has become ill. Nebraska has successfully treated Dr. Richard A Sacra, and is currently treating NBC freelancer Ashoka Mukpo, who appears to be recovering.

Dr. Isakov ... suggested that perhaps communities prepare by identifying which hospitals had the resources to successfully treat patients, and  set up a transfer system.

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http://time.com/3507798/ebola-atlanta-nebraska-cdc/