What is Coronavirus? with Karrie Austin

*The following is the output of transcribing from an audio recording. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors.

The following is a podcast from a qualified senior care provider part on the answers for elders radio show. And welcome everyone to answers for elders radio and we are here for a very special program that many of you may have not even heard our show before, but some things are going on right now in our communities where we have a state of emergency and a lot of our especially our seniors, are vulnerable to coronavirus, Aka covid nineteen, and we are very blessed today to have Madam Carrie Austin here from dispatch health. Carrie, welcome to the show. Thank you for having me, Carrie. I’m so glad that you’re here, because people are in hysterics. I have to say my phone’s been blowing up, our social media is blowing up. I’m hearing all of these crazy things that aren’t true. I’ve had to really calm people down because it’s not as bad as what we really think it is, and yet we do need to protect ourselves because there is a virus going around. So, Carrie, what I’d love to do is take some time with you and talk about fact versus fiction. You know what is coronavirus. What does it do? And through this our hopefully we’ll have an opportunity to just kind of dive in so that people can understand really what it is that we’re dealing with. And so thank you for being here, thank you for am so, dispatch health, before we start, I want to tell give you guys, I’m major plug, because you guys actually go to people’s homes and you are like an ear triage company, basically, that you can help with a lot of the symptoms. A lot of people are feeling like they need to be checked, they’re not feeling well whatever. So tell us a little about first, before we start. What is dispatch health? Do sure? So, dispatch health is an acute on demand service that’s available to anyone in the community from the age of three months through the lifespan, and we truly operate as a mobile urgent care service, if you will, that has the capabilities of sending out a team of two to your home to include either in this practitioner or physician assistant. So the same level of care that you would receive if you went into an ear or an ear to be seen, along with an EMT train tech and then the capabilities that we are able to support when we come out to the home. gives us the ability to assess a patient, treat the patient and then refer the patient for additional resources as needed. Right so people are right now. Just just so you know, if you think that you’re not feeling well and you’re concerned and meet you know, maybe you have a bad cold or you have flu like SYS symptoms, we will give information regarding dispatch health, because they’re a great option for you to do, you know, for the your first call, because a lot of times people are saying don’t go to the Yar, and we’ll talk a little bit about that. So let’s go back carry and talk about what is coronavirus. People don’t even know what the symptoms are anymore. I mean they’re just so confused. So coronavirus mimic. It’s a mimics itself very similar to the flu. So when we’re talking about symptoms that we’re going to see in somebody that’s presenting with coronavirus, it’s a fever, a cough or shortness of breath. But really what we need to take into considerations heads they’re been a level of exposure, whether known or not so. And really the key areas this that we’re focusing on are anyone that’s had recent travel in the last two weeks to either China, Iran, Italy, Japan or South Korea. HMM. And then or if they’ve been in an area or exposed into a very highly populated area where there’s been a lot of sick people, if you will. HMM. And so obviously in this area, you know, a lot of everything has been you know, talking about. So it’s similar to the flu, but there are some differences, aren’t there? There are with the flu. You tend you have body aches, sore throat, headaches. This really is primarily focused on that fever, cough and shortness of breath component, right. So in especially in our aging patient population that have underlying diseases such as coopd or congestive heart failure, they’re going to be more susceptible if you’re any sort of respiratory is right from what I understand. Yeah, and and obviously our seniors more susceptible because our lung capacity changes. Is that correct? As we get older? That’s correct. So obviously in you know, as as seniors, if you have a senior loved one, that is a smoker or former smoker. That could be a little bit more elevated of the concern, wouldn’t it be? It is it puts you it more risk for developing an in rice or or becoming more sick from an unless such as the flu or if expose the coronavirus. Right, I know AARP just did an amazing right up to talked about basically, you know what is coronavirus and why our seniors more susceptible. And you know, one of the things that we know about our our seniors is because of the lung capacity changes as we get older. It’s not as much. We can’t clear out as much as we can when we’re younger. So when we take in a virus, obviously seniors are more susceptible anyway to any kind of virus. So obviously, if something like this happens, we have to be mindful that this could mean a lot. But the majority of us, like we’ve talked about, I’ve heard carry that this may have been going on for the last two three weeks before we even knew that it was here. Is that correct? That is correct. The incubation period for covid nineteen coronavirus is anywhere between two and fourteen days. So someone could have been exposed two weeks ago and not developed any symptoms until that fourteen day. So at that point it’s concerning that it’s been around a little longer, right, than maybe we had anticipated, because it’s really just now come to fruition and really popularity in the news. But it’s probably been around here for the last, you know, a few weeks and people just thought that it was just the regular fluors, right along those life right. So we are talking again to carry Austin. She is the regional marketing director for dispatched help and you are a nurse yourself and an e our nurse, so you’ve seen a lot of these situations in your past career and and certainly been amazing with our seniors. And you know, one of the things that’s so awesome about you, carry is when I talk to other people in the industry, people love you. You you have such a heart for our older adults and here, you know, to hear your thoughts. I’m so glad you’re here because there’s a lot of questions that people are having. So, Carrie, tell us a little about obviously you guys are despatch health, you guys go all over. If you’re you’re going to ask the questions. If so, let’s say somebody has flu symptoms, they’re going to call you and you’re going to go see that patient. Obviously you build their insurance. So usually it’s just a copey. If that isn’t it correct? The cost of the patient for dispatch health to come out directly to your home and treat you, Hmm, is whatever your urgent care cope is based on your insurance very very inexpensive, and Medicare obviously has, you know, very low copay. Correct. So that’s great. So obviously, talking about the whole phenomena of coronavirus, you know, one of the things I’m going to just go back to now life care center of Kirklin. Right. That’s kind of the nucleus, and yet they can’t find out how it got there. This is really common. It could, like you said, an incubation period could have been two weeks before. Correct. Correct. So obviously if somebody traveled to one of those countries or they were exposed or having symptoms and walked in, they would have spread it there. Is that correct? That’s probably how it got there. Most likely. Yes, either it was a family either it was a family member of a resident that currently is staying in that community, or it could have been a family member that was exposed to someone else and UN unknowingly brought that with them in when they were visiting their family member. Because, again, the incubation period being between two and fourteen days, you can still spread the disease without even knowing you haven’t sometimes. And also, just to understand people, like you said, people could have thought they had the flu cor and they didn’t and they had it. So in this scenario, of course, this is a nursing home, this is a nursing facility where the patients there are in compromised health. Those are the you know, the individuals that are most at risk. I think there’s a lot of hysteria over Oh, if I get if I go into Seattle, I know I’ve just talked to somebody today. They were going to come in from out of town for a meeting and they chose not to because the coronavirus is here. Well, first of all, it’s probably everywhere and it’s probably been around here for a long time. So the point of the matter being is we have to understand that. That’s not going to nobody’s telling you not to go into the city of Seattle, nobody’s telling you not to do certain things. It’s just to be mindful, is that correct? Correct, and be mindful of your own personal health safety. So washing your hands, something as simple as washing your hands, covering your mouth when you cough, if you’re not feeling well, staying at home so you’re not exposing anyone else, and we’re going to do a segment all about that. So we’re going to go into that next one. But just a little bit more of, you know, being mindful of who you are or who you are and you know, don’t now. It’s not the time to be hugging and and handshaking and all kinds of stuff. And so it’s like the part of me was like, oh, carry I want to you that, but just understand that this is manageable for the average adult. Nobody’s going to die if you’re if you’re in a situation where you’re, you know, in good health, that or not. It couldn’t. It’s going to be more like a flute. Is that correct? That’s correct, for the for the for most patients, most patients are going to do very well. They’re going to make a full recovery. It’s going to be very similar to having the flu. But again, when we start talking about our aging patient population or anyone that’s immunocompromised as a weakened immune system, this could this could pose a little bit more of a threat to them for sure. So if somebody’s having flu symptoms right now or they’re feeling like they need just a second opinion, they can call despatch health. And how do we reach you? You can the phone number for dispatch health is four to five, five hundred and fifty three zero nine three seven. So four to five, five five three, zero nine three seven. That’ll get you directly in contact with our call center. They’ll walk you through a re stratification process to understand better what your symptoms are and see where the appropriate the appropriate service for you at this time, and then we can book that visit in and get you have that. I bet you guys are really busy, but you know we are very busy. Carry is going to be with this for the entire hour, so should be right back. Answers for elders radio show with Susan Newman. Hopes you found this podcast useful in your journey of navigating senior care. Check out more podcast like this to help you find qualified senior care experts and areas of financial, legal, health and wellness and living options. Learn about our radio show, receive our monthly newsletter, receive promotional discounts and meet our experts by clicking on the banner to join the Senior Advocate Network at answers for elders, radiocom. Now there is one place to find the answers for elders.