CHICAGO, IL – The Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) announced that interns will no longer see patients not only to preserve personal protective equipment (PPE) but also so they can be redeployed to check on healthcare workers’ parents.
“It’s no secret that PPE is running low at hospitals nationwide, which is why interns have been recently asked to not see patients, preserving PPE for nurses, respiratory therapists, attendings, and others instead,” stated Dr. Thomas Nasca, President of the ACMGE. “However, our interns are still very essential healthcare workers, which is why they will be tasked with the critically important role of checking in on all of our parents until this crisis is over.”
A recent study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that 50% of the health care force’s parents are not abiding by social distancing recommendations. The reason for this remains unclear. Still in the throes of managing COVID-19 patients, health care workers have been unable to check in on their parents as much as they’d like.
In addition, their parents won’t listen to them.
“This will provide invaluable teaching opportunities for our interns as it puts them in a position to navigate very challenging family meetings, even if it is my own family,” explained emergency medicine attending Dr. Rachel Shin. “Now, interns, if my dad won’t stay within the house, just do whatever you have to do, I don’t care. Use four-point restraints or Haldol, you have my blessing. Whatever it takes to keep his butt at home!”
