St. John's Hospital Springfield Illinois issued the following announcement on Jan. 27.
During the past two weeks, HSHS St. John’s Hospital had a very limited amount of extra COVID-19 vaccinations that we were happy to provide to some Springfield senior citizens after the hospital finished vaccinating its healthcare workers. The hospital has provided around 5,000 doses of the vaccine so far – this includes some second doses for HSHS employees.
“We believe it is important to get people safely vaccinated as quickly as possible,” said Dr. Marc Shelton, VP and chief clinical officer at HSHS. “When we receive more doses of the vaccine, we plan to vaccinate as many people as possible in accordance with CDC and public health guidelines.”
At this time, it is important to stress that St. John’s Hospital does not have any additional COVID-19 vaccines available to the public. As many are aware, the demand for this vaccine is currently far exceeding the supply. Calls and in-person requests for this vaccination simply cannot be accommodated at this time.
St. John’s Hospital was recently able to invite a small group of age 65+ patients at Prairie Heart Institute and HSHS Medical Group who had active MyChart accounts (our online patient portal) to receive the vaccine. We reached out to these patients through MyChart and were overwhelmed by the gratitude of patients who received the vaccine.
“We’re really rejoicing that we got this shot today,” said Victor Edwards, 78, of Springfield after receiving the COVID-19 vaccine at St. John’s Hospital. “We’ve been waiting for this for a long time. My wife and I have been pretty tightly quarantined since last March, and I think a little bit tighter than most. We even require our children and visitors to wear masks and so forth. We do the shields and gloves and the whole bit.”
The 65+ demographic has been identified to be covered in the vaccination phase 1B by the CDC, state and local public health departments. St. John’s Hospital will continue to assist in any way it can in accordance with their guidance and direction. HSHS plans to utilize MyChart for future vaccine announcements, and we encourage the public to sign up for a MyChart account if they don’t have one at www.hshsmyhealthrecord.com. Patients with questions can call the vaccine hotline at 1-844-216-4707
Original source can be found here.
Source: St. John's Hospital Springfield Illinois
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