DCH Coronavirus Update 1-28-21

Sharing a Little Light …

The daughter of a former patient at DCH Regional Medical Center recently donated pocket-sized flashlights and included hand-written notes to the 21 nurses who took care of her father during his stay. The daughter, who gave us permission to share this story, said she donated them because her father said they needed them. Doing their best not to disturb him, the nurses would not turn on the lights while they checked on him.

His daughter, saddened by the visitation restrictions at the time, was also grateful that a nurse offered to decorate his room with family photos and some of his favorite items. “My prayers were answered over and over again by those nurses, doctors and technicians,” the daughter said.

So, if you notice nurses with flashlights clipped to their scrubs, be sure to thank them for shining their own light with patients.

Testing and Confirmed Cases

To protect patient privacy, DCH has established a minimum threshold of five for reporting numbers of inpatients with laboratory-confirmed cases of COVID-19.

DCH Health System internal counts as of 3:16 p.m. on 1/28/21:

• 132 inpatients within the DCH system who are positive for COVID-19.
• 35 inpatients who are positive for COVID-19 are being treated in the ICU.
• 13 who are positive for COVID-19 are on ventilators.
• 9 who are positive for COVID-19 are on a BiPAP.
• 8,036 (cumulative) unique positives for COVID-19 tests including results from the ED, triage tent and inpatient. These individuals are not necessarily in the hospital.
• 35,298 (cumulative) unique negatives for COVID-19 at DCH sites.
• 9,694 (cumulative) positive COVID-19 at DCH sites. These individuals are not necessarily in the hospital. 
• 63,326 (cumulative) negative tests at DCH sites.
• 2,597 inpatients (cumulative) who were positive for COVID-19 have been discharged.
• 478 inpatients (cumulative) who were positive for COVID-19 have died at DCH. This is not an indication of the cause of death, only that the individuals were positive for COVID-19 at the time of death.
• 195 Tuscaloosa County residents (cumulative) who were positive for COVID-19 have died (per the Alabama Department of Public Health).