The Rust Belt and COVID-19

Due to the many changes surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, Northeast Ohio Medical University College of Medicine’s Class of 2020 ended its education with final rotations on COVID-19 topics.

Ariana Ellis, M.D. (’20), and Maria Kenner, M.D. (’20), reflect here on their experience with the Youngstown City Health Department. During the month-long rotation, the pair fielded calls from the community about the disease and provided information. The students also contacted nursing homes and assisted living facilities to assess preparedness for the pandemic.

Because we both grew up in the Mahoning Valley, we were eager to begin our first day at the Youngstown City Health District. After a welcome meeting and orientation, we soon began receiving and making phone calls for the Health Department.

One of the main tasks assigned to us was to track cases of COVID-19 in the City of Youngstown. This was done by identifying positive cases, then calling the patient to determine all of the individuals with whom they had been in contact within 14 days of developing symptoms and/or receiving a positive test result. Once information was gathered for all at-risk individuals, we began to contact them.

Our first phone call with the person consisted of establishing rapport, describing why we were reaching out, asking if they were experiencing any symptoms, and most important, telling them to self-quarantine for 14 days following the last exposure to their positive contact. We then continued to call, screen for symptoms and answer questions for the remainder of their self-quarantine.

Evaluating preparedness

The second project we worked on was contacting nursing homes and assisted living facilities in the City of Youngstown to assess each their preparedness in combating COVID-19.

Using an infection prevention and control assessment tool (Tele-ICAR) created by the CDC and Ohio Department of Health, we began making phone calls to survey the facilities. Soon after beginning our calls, we received feedback from facilities that they were unable to complete the 30-minute assessment over the phone, due to time restraints. We then created an online survey that could be filled out via Google Forms, which would encourage staff at the facilities to complete the assessment at their own convenience.

Overall, our call center experience was very rewarding.

Communicating with patients who were actively experiencing symptoms helped us understand COVID-19 better, including the wide range of symptom severity. Because we were communicating with patients daily, we appreciated the joy they had when they began to feel better and the worry they still had about becoming sick again.

We discovered that an important piece of calling individuals is giving them the correct information about COVID-19 at a level they understand. Some of the patients needed information at a health literacy level that wasn’t being presented by the media. Our call center experience showed us the importance of presenting broadcasts at a lower health literacy level so more individuals could learn correct information.