Lack of proper training and availability of the correct protective gear are among the many problems facing nurses and hospital staff in treating Ebola patients, says the president of the Minnesota Nurses Association.
"There's a huge disconnect over best practices, availability of equipment and how to use that equipment," Linda Hamilton told Ed Berliner on "MidPoint" on
Newsmax TV Thursday.
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She said that when it comes to hazmat suits that nurses in Minnesota "have not had any training in that whatsoever."
In addition, she says that "we have not had good training in how to deal with a disease as serious as Ebola."
And she said that many hospitals do not have hazmat suits available.
"We asked nurses at our yearly convention [if] they feel prepared to care for a patient with Ebola, if they know how to use the protective equipment, and if they have that available," Hamilton explained. "They said, 'No.'"
As for this lack of training, she says that certainly the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has "dropped the ball."
"The fact is they did not come out right away and say what we need to do to protect ourselves," she said.
"We really need to use the hazmat suits and full protection because we get exposed to diseases," she contends. "That means that we expose others and that's not right."
"If we don't have the right equipment within easy reach, knowing how to use it, and having had the drills to prove that we know how to use it, we failed our community," she added.
However, Hamilton told Newsmax that the Ebola virus will serve as a good opportunity to make sure the medical community knows how to handle such diseases in the future.
"This Ebola scare is an opportunity for everybody in America to look at how we deal with infectious diseases," she said.
"This is an opportunity that we can use to learn what we need to learn because right now any serious infectious disease that comes into our emergency department, we do not have the training, the knowledge, and the drills that we need to care for a patient immediately," she added.
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