1.243 health items, weekly news

Friday 7/31/2020

I went for a run this morning and it felt completely normal throughout. However as I walked the last block to CH I noticed a general mild feeling of weakness. No nausea or giddyness, just general feebleness. I went upstairs and checked my vitals and was relieved to find temp 98.1, BP slightly high at 140/114, pulse slightly low at 62. I’m always on the lookout for signs my artificial aortic valve is breaking down, but that BP and pulse is the exact opposite of what you’d expect if the valve were failing; it would cause a high pulse and low BP. So I had what I meant to be a bit of a nap, but turned into an hour slumber, and then felt normal again.

Except for a toe. One toe had felt sore last night and this morning and, hello, it was showing gout. Is this not a classical presentation of gout? Rubor, dolor, little bit of calor. I’ve had a few episodes of gout before. Welp, guess I have another. By evening it was cooling off a bit. All the news that fits…

Did not do much except read, and a bit on the model. Rhonda’s 4pm Covid conference had some interesting news items. One, owing to the severe staff crunch, with 26 employees quarantined at home pending tests, with the head chef doing prep work, the food services manager running the dishwashers, and the housekeeping staff delivering meals, they are reassessing some things. They have stopped trying to spray-sterilize the many incoming packages, partly because of staff time, partly because the spray disinfectant, the same as they use on the elevators, hand-rails, etc., is in short supply, and partly because current advice is that the chance of virus transmission by packages is low.

And they are planning to re-open the garages for full access! Another week of limited return times, and then we’ll be able to bring our cars back in any time.

Another interesting, and reassuring, item was about our policies with respect to those staff members who can’t work. I’ll quote Rhonda’s remarks as received in email later,

Within hours of receiving a positive test result, Kim Kurtis (our Human Resources Director) and Paola Robles (our Human Resources Assistant) goes to every department for impromptu staff meetings. They… answer questions from staff and address their fears. They offer support services which have included hotel stays for those who do not want to risk exposure to their families, to Instacart deliveries for an employee who was too ill to shop for their family. … And, they check in on employees while they are out to see if there are any additional ways we can support them.
 
You may also like to know that Channing House has always had a generous policy for Paid Time Off (PTO). We always required that anyone with a fever, or various other symptoms, stay home. Our generous PTO policy supports that expectation. Our COVID PTO policy enhances that with the ability to use more PTO than an employee has earned. Which means that the employee continues to be paid while they cannot come to work when it’s related to COVID.

It is really nice to know we take care of our staff in this way.