[Music playing]
My name is Jennifer Graves.
Today, we are here at one of our two tents
built on a soccer field
at our COVID-19 Assessment Center and Recovery Center.
[Music playing]
I’ve been a nurse for more than 30 years.
This has been a true labor of love project.
[Music continues]
In our State, in Washington,
we have one of the lowest [number sof] hospital beds per capita in the country.
As the pandemic unfolded, there was great worry
as we were learning more about the disease spread,
trying to figure out, how do we make sure that people had care in the community and
reserve our hospital beds for those who most need it.
So our president at Kaiser Permenante met with the leaders of Public Health
and said what needs do you have.
And Patty Hayes, who is the director of Public Health Seattle and King County
and she said, what if we partnered to staff this big structure that we are building.
The homeless population is getting COVID a little bit later
than some of the other populations in WA.
The people [whom] we are serving here are people who would not be getting care any place else.
There’s no discussion when people are coming about insurance coverage
or lack of insurance coverage or people’s ability to pay.
This is all free.
For assessment, we can bring people from homeless shelters,
people who are living in tents and people who don't have other resources.
do the COVID-19 testing.
The recovery piece is for people who are known COVID positive.
They need a safe place to go to be isolated that can still take care of their medical needs.
So this is a little bit lower level of care than a hospital
but it’s still staffed by clinical staff 24 hours a day.
Good morning.
The first thing I need to do is get your temperature
and then we’re gonna do a symptoms check before we get you your scrubs. OK.
OK. Here you go. Thank you!
The question often will come up about personal protective equipment and testing supplies
We know different places across the country are in different situations.
In Washington State, there’s been a lot of working together to make sure that everyone has resources.
It doesn’t mean that we aren’t looking at our supply chain every single day, because we are.
So everyone who goes into the tent to care for people is in full PPE.
Two sets of gloves, because we treat one set of gloves on the lower half like it’s your skin.
a full gown, a mask, and we also provide a full head or face shield
so that all of the mucous membranes on the face so eyes, nose, mouth are completely covered.
We check each other off on a buddy-system on our PPE
as we are going in and as we are going out.
So as a buddy, she’d come to me and she’d show me.
I am looking to make sure that the arm cuffs of her gloves and the sleeves are completely covered.
There is no gap, or skin visible and the shield’s intact.
Mask, I am verifying the fit and just making sure she’s looking covered. Turn around for me. Great.”
We are really careful to have each other’s back literally and figuratively.
The staff who are here, volunteer, completely willingly to come.
[Music playing]
Everyone is positive and working together and knows that what they are doing is really meaningful.
I’ve been here pretty much seven days a week.
I don’t think we should turn away from people who are most in need of our care.
I became a nurse because it’s my calling.
I am a cancer survivor, I go in just like everybody else.
This feels right.
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We had a staff member on Sunday [who] chose to come and work 12 hours on her birthday
because this is where she wanted to celebrate.
So, lots of stories like that.
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There's two tents.
Tent one is where we have all of our patients cohorted right now.
They each hold up to 70 patients.
With individual rooms, if you will, with a cot and foot locker or belongings.
We've installed at every bedside a light switch
that will flick on a red light that we'll be able to notice from anywhere in the tent
when patients need to call for help.
Outside of the tent, they can grab a hot shower whenever they would like.
We can take patients out for small supervised walks.
We realize, exercise and fresh air is really, really important.
[Music playing]
There are community members who are
leaving little rocks and little crosses with messages all of the property for us.
There was a little painted rock yesterday that said, 'We got this!'
[Music playing]
I made the right career choice in becoming a nurse.
I have great hopes for our healthcare system
and when we get focused on doing the right things for our community
we can do things quickly and we can do things in partnership with others
and we can make a better healthcare system for the future.
and I am hoping that we take those lessons away after this pandemic leaves our midst.