Patient rehabilitation teams are pitching in to do everything from cleaning emergency department treatment rooms to helping with respiratory therapy at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Plano as the latest major COVID-19 surge continues.

The inpatient and outpatient physical therapists and others including assistants and speech pathologists are still maintaining their usual patient loads but also volunteering for shifts, sometimes on weekends, to get the jobs done for grateful emergency department caregivers.

"They constantly were saying thank you, thank you so much. They were just exhausted and any little bit of help really went a long way," said Kaley Van Winkle, D.P..T, P..T, CES, an outpatient therapist who helped on a Saturday. "It meant the world to them to have some of that help."

She worked a four-hour shift in the emergency department recently on a Saturday, when her husband was home to care for their child.

Laurie Davis, P.T.A., also an outpatient therapist, called her emergency department shift on a Sunday "interesting and exciting." She and another therapist were charged with cleaning emergency department treatment rooms as soon as patients were transferred to inpatient rooms in hospital units.

"Someone else was going to be in the treatment rooms in like two minutes," she said. "We did some very fast cleaning, sanitized the beds, put sheets on. We also stocked linens in the rooms we were in — it was a real team effort. We were trying to make sure they didn't get backed up on those rooms."

Physical therapists, who are skilled at transporting, also are helping move patients as rooms in units open.

Helping respiratory therapists

Inpatient physical therapist Nikki Javier-Vong, D.P.T., P.T., below, is helping with respiratory therapy patients in all-COVID units and others, something she did during a previous surge. About half of the patients she cares for have been either COVID-positive or persons under investigation.

This time, she said, patients have been younger. "I was saying 'Oh my gosh, you're my age.'"

Javier-Vong is assisting with oxygen saturation checks, assessments for home oxygen needs and inspirometer checks, all procedures physical therapists are trained in. Inspirometers show how much air a patient takes in.

Ashley Jones, M.B.A., OTR, director of rehabilitation services, said that as of Tuesday, Aug. 24, seven physical therapists were helping respiratory therapists and nine others were helping in the emergency department and in patient units.

Physical therapists also helped during a previous surge, as the outpatient unit was shut down twice in 2020. The staff of about 90 people worked as screeners, greeters, patient care technicians on COVID floors and in the labs.

"Our rehab staff has been very helpful and useful and supportive of their colleagues in the hospital, just to try to help wherever we can," she said.

Josh Floren, hospital president, added, "This embodies the teamwork our caregivers have always shown at Texas Health Plano. We help each other so we can deliver quality patient care throughout the hospital."