COVID-19 Health Worker Data Alliance Aims to Establish Best Practices in the Battle Against the Virus

By

A new health worker data collection campaign, supported in part by the Robert R. McCormick Foundation, is tracking the physical, psychological, and occupational effects on frontline medical staff treating patients during the COVID-19 pandemic.


The Health Worker Data Alliance created a confidential, HIPPA-compliant, web-based survey that collects self-reported data from frontline health workers in weekly intervals. The survey link can be texted out by each hospital’s administrators one time, and their workforce can elect to participate. All data is independently collected, contains identifiers that can only be accessed by the researchers, and takes four minutes to complete.

“Health workers are three times more likely to contract COVID-19,” said Maria Demopoulos, project director and Founder of Athe Consulting. “This is an alarming rate. And even after the curve flattens, they will continue to be exposed for a long time. But having information on how quickly they become sick, how long they are staying home, and tracking their mental health can enable the healthcare community to receive better support so they, in turn, can provide the best care to those in our communities battling COVID-19.”

While hospitals and the broader health community have raced to prepare facilities and health workers to diagnose and care for patients with COVID-19, personal health and well-being data from these practitioners has not been systematically tracked.

The results, to be presented free of charge to organizational participants on a weekly basis, will equip hospital administrators with information for how best to use their most valuable and limited resource: their workforce.

For those institutions with high levels of participation, data will be analyzed at the institutional level and shared without personal identifiers with the institution’s administrators to give them key insights into how COVID-19 is impacting their workforce. The data from all participants will be anonymous and aggregated at the Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) level and made available to the broader public health community to strengthen insights at the city and regional levels without identifying individual institutions.

The project will better inform the battle against the virus, especially in communities who are preparing for the surge.

“This effort is vital as it will provide hospital administrators and health associations indicators on their staff or membership that highlight their physical and mental health conditions and needs, including burnout,” said Rebekah Levin, Director of Evaluation for the McCormick Foundation.

For more information on the survey project, visit the Health Worker Data Alliance.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Home Visiting Helps Combat Effects of Toxic Stress in Young Children

By
Guest blog by Diana Rauner, President, Ounce of Prevention Fund & Gaylord Gieseke, Vice President, Voices for Illinois Children  The number of children at risk for the short and long-term effects of toxic childhood stress is growing dramatically. This was the dismal news highlighted in a policy statement released last month by the American Academy of Pediatrics and in a recent op-ed from New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof. Both cite new research that demonstrates that the cumulative effects of growing up in environments replete with violence, parental depression, chaos and other uncertainties can literally alter the healthy, normal development of a young child’s brain. These stressors can impede a child’s capacity to “power down” from the fight or flight reflex, which reduces his ability to manage his temper and emotions or show empathy to others. It can also lead to later drug and alcohol use, obesity, heart disease and even early death. But it doesn’t have to be th...
Read more

Preschool Attendance Matters

By
Image
by Stacy Ehrlich and Julia Gwynne  Nationally, there has been a great effort to increase funding for early education programs to increase enrollment of at-risk children into high-quality programs, such as Head Start. However, recent research highlights that once children are enrolled in preschool, they must also regularly attend to reap the benefits. A study conducted by the University of Chicago Consortium on Chicago School Research, in collaboration with Chicago Public Schools, found that preschool students who are chronically absent – meaning they miss 10 percent or more of enrolled school days – have lower levels of math, letter recognition, and social-emotional skills by the time they enter kindergarten than children who attend regularly. In the 2011-12 school year, 45 percent of 3-year-olds and more than one-third of 4-year-olds were missing this much school – equivalent to three weeks. Moreover, for a portion of these students, preschool is the beginning of a pattern t...
Read more

Tracing America's Painful Past Can Offer Lessons for the Future

By
Image
On Saturday night, staff from the Robert R. McCormick Foundation will be attending the DuSable Museum of African American History’s “Night of 100 Stars,” a benefit highlighting the amazing achievements of notable individuals, including artist and musician Chancelor “Chance the Rapper” Bennett, former World Food Program executive director Ertharin Cousin, and Lonnie Bunch, the founding director of the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington D.C. and former president of the Chicago History Museum. Lonnie Bunch also had a piece in today’s New York Times about a recent incident at the National Museum in whcih someone placed a noose near one of the museum’s exhibits. This follows instances of nooses being left elsewhere on the National Mall in recent weeks, and in other places around the country as signs of racial hate and intimidation. Bunch offers a powerful view into the continuing story of racism and bigotry in this country, as well as our uneven progre...
Read more