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Resuming Surgical Scheduling on May 11 (Subject to Approval from the Governor)

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We appreciate the support of Kettering Health Network surgeons and office staffs as we have adhered to the governor’s mandate for restricting elective surgeries, limiting them to those deemed essential.  Like everyone else, we are looking forward to opening our surgery schedules with a focus on keeping our patients, staff, and physicians safe.

Effective May 11, subject to approval from regulators, Kettering Health Network will begin performing outpatient surgeries. You may begin scheduling cases now using the fax form that has been in use during the COVID-19 pandemic. We will also continue to do cases that meet the governor’s existing criteria.

At this time, we are restricting surgeries where the patient would require a bed after surgery, even for a short stay, unless they meet the governor’s criteria.  All patients will be expected to be discharged from the PACU or postop area after surgery.

There are a few caveats to this decision:

  • If the governor should determine that we can resume elective surgeries earlier, we will open the schedule as soon as possible after that date and will notify you of that decision.
  • If the governor delays a decision to resume surgery, we will need to push the May 11 date back.
  • At this point in time we do not believe we will offer day of surgery testing due to the inability to obtain the tests. Therefore, we will be screening patients through the PAT process. Patients who screen positive will be postponed and your office will be notified.  
  • We will accept scheduling at the following locations:
    • Kettering Medical Center (including the SSC)
    • Grandview Medical Center
    • Soin Medical Center
    • Troy Hospital
    • Fort Hamilton Hospital
    • Southview Hospital (including the Hand Center)
    • Sycamore Medical Center

In order to optimize the schedule, we are establishing specialty and group blocks to try to accommodate the volume of cases that we expect. Cases will be scheduled on a first-come, first-served basis within the blocks. We are looking to have blocks filled between 0700 and 1700.  Surgeons will be notified by perioperative leadership of changes to block schedules.

This will be the first phase of our reopening with the goal of rapidly allowing other cases to be scheduled as soon as possible as allowed by the governor.  We anticipate that within one or two weeks of May 11 we will be accepting all patients on the surgery schedule.

April 22, 2020
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