![\"Joseph](\"https:\/\/blogs.cooperhealth.org\/sjmedicalreport\/files\/2021\/11\/Joseph-M-Montella-MD-MS-CPE.jpg\")
Joseph M. Montella, MD
Chief Medical Officer, Cooper University\u00a0Health Care<\/p><\/div>\n
\u201cNew Jersey realized early on that they needed a regional strategy to respond to the massive influx of patients in our hospitals,\u201d says Joseph M. Montella, MD, MS, CPE<\/a>, Chief Medical Officer for Cooper. \u201cThey divided the state into three regions and designated three academic medical centers as regional hubs\u2014University Hospital in Newark, Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, and Cooper in Camden.\u201d<\/p>\n Internally, Cooper initiated its incident management structure, which organizes decision making, staff, and resources to respond to disasters. The Incident Management Team addressed critical issues, including communications, patient surge, and procurement of sufficient personal protective equipment (PPE) to keep staff and patients from contracting the COVID-19 virus.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were especially conscientious about using PPE appropriately and not wasting it,\u201d Dr. Montella says.<\/p>\n Cooper was fortunate to have a newly constructed ICU, which served as a second critical care unit. The post-anesthesia care unit (PACU) was repurposed as an ICU for non-COVID-19 patients. However, an ICU cannot operate without trained practitioners, and Cooper solved this problem with a creative approach to staffing.<\/p>\n Nitin K. Puri, MD \u201cThe trauma intensivists joined forces with us and took care of the non-COVID-19 critical care patients so we could focus on those with COVID-19,\u201d says Nitin K. Puri, MD<\/a>, Division Head of Critical Care Medicine. \u201cWe partnered med\/surg nurses with critical care nurses in the ICU. The critical care nurses delivered the critical level of care, and the med\/surg nurses provided less intensive care.\u201d<\/p>\n Innovation didn\u2019t stop with staffing models. Cooper also pushed the envelope in the treatment of the sickest COVID-19 patients. Proning, or the act of turning intubated patients to lie on their stomach, became a popular approach to treating very sick patients throughout the country.<\/p>\n \u201cAt Cooper, we made the decision to prone every patient as soon as they were intubated to improve their oxygen intake,\u201d says Dr. Puri. \u201cBut proning is labor intensive, and when you are turning 20 or 30 people a day, it can quickly become overwhelming.\u201d<\/p>\n To handle the volume of patients and ensure the expertise of the staff responsible for this task, Cooper created multidisciplinary proning teams.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were also very aggressive about the use of ECMO [extracorporeal membrane oxygenation] because we felt it would help,\u201d says Dr. Puri. \u201cAnd for many patients, it did.\u201d<\/p>\n ECMO is used to support the heart or lungs when a ventilator cannot provide adequate assistance.<\/p>\n During the pandemic, elective surgeries were put on hold, but emergency and trauma procedures continued.<\/p>\n John M. Porter, MD \u201cCooper is South Jersey\u2019s only Level I Trauma Center for adults and Level II Trauma Center for pediatrics,\u201d says John M. Porter, MD<\/a>, Division Head of Trauma Surgery. \u201cSo it was vital that we kept those services active.\u201d<\/p>\n Dr. Porter is also Medical Director of Supply Chain, and he played an integral role in ensuring that Cooper had an adequate supply of PPE to keep staff and patients safe, although he gives credit to Thomas Runkle, Vice President of Supply Chain.<\/p>\n \u201cTom spent a lot of time on the phone securing supplies\u2014 calling manufacturers as far away as China and Malaysia\u2014and capitalizing on Cooper\u2019s relationship with the State Department to arrange air transportation,\u201d says Dr. Porter.<\/p>\n Cooper also took steps to alleviate stress and provide support for staff who faced an increased volume of patients and the emotional effects of being exposed to a virus about which little was known. \u201cWe established a Resiliency Team early on, made up of clinical psychologists from our Psychiatry Department,\u201d says Dr. Montella. \u201cThey would visit the floors and talk to staff, giving staff someone to share their fears with.\u201d<\/p>\n Primary care physicians also played a key role in the COVID-19 response. A telehealth system was set up in less than a week to support remote visits and reduce traffic in physician offices.<\/p>\n \u201cWe really counted on our primary care providers to take care of patients in the community, if possible, and direct patients to the correct level of care, which eased pressure on the ED,\u201d says Dr. Montella. \u201cAnd they did an amazing job.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI think the reason we were so successful is that we have a great group of people who share their ideas, and those views are welcomed by leadership,\u201d says Dr. Montella. \u201cSometimes in a crisis there\u2019s an impulse to respond very quickly, but we went through multiple layers of vetting to try to get everything right\u2026 our end point was taking great care of patients and making sure our staff was engaged and safe. And I think we accomplished that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Faced with a worldwide pandemic, Cooper leadership, physicians, and staff joined forces to provide bold, innovative care to some of the region\u2019s sickest COVID-19 patients. \u201cNew Jersey realized early on that they needed a regional strategy to respond to the massive influx of patients in our hospitals,\u201d says Joseph M. Montella, MD, MS, CPE, Chief … [Read more…]<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,55,4],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"entry","1":"post","2":"publish","3":"author-rmineo","4":"post-1925","6":"format-standard","7":"category-featured","8":"category-new-initiatives","9":"category-news-updates"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cooperhealth.org\/sjmedicalreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1925","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cooperhealth.org\/sjmedicalreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cooperhealth.org\/sjmedicalreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cooperhealth.org\/sjmedicalreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cooperhealth.org\/sjmedicalreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1925"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cooperhealth.org\/sjmedicalreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1925\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1930,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cooperhealth.org\/sjmedicalreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1925\/revisions\/1930"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cooperhealth.org\/sjmedicalreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1925"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cooperhealth.org\/sjmedicalreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1925"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cooperhealth.org\/sjmedicalreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1925"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Nitin](\"https:\/\/blogs.cooperhealth.org\/sjmedicalreport\/files\/2021\/11\/Nitin-K-Puri-MD.jpg\")
Division Head, Critical Care Medicine<\/p><\/div>\n![\"John](\"https:\/\/blogs.cooperhealth.org\/sjmedicalreport\/files\/2021\/11\/John-M-Porter-MD.jpg\")
Division Head, Trauma Surgery<\/p><\/div>\n