Photo By NMCCL Public Affairs | U.S. Navy Hospitalman Corpsman Demetria Garvin is part of the NMCCL Contact Tracing...... read more read more
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CAMP LEJEUNE, NC- For more than six months, Naval Medical Center Camp Lejeune has been battling the global pandemic that is COVID-19. While epidemiologists work around the clock to better understand the virus, medical personnel from laboratory technicians to pharmacists, nurses to paramedics are having to translate information quickly for their patients and the public.
“We pay close attention to lessons learned and best practices outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Department of Defense health experts,” explains U.S. Navy Lieutenant Eric Green, addressing the more than 20 attendees of NMCCL’s recent Contact Tracing Course. “Our contact tracing has revealed some local trends that we immediately act upon to educate our forces and beneficiaries as well as develop our own local best practices.”
Green serves as the department head for NMCCL Preventive Medicine and as Assistant Public Health Emergency Officer for Marine Corps Installations East. As COVID-19 took just a matter of weeks to permeate throughout Eastern North Carolina, Green and NMCCL Preventive Medicine quickly determined the undeniable need for a team dedicated to tracing close contacts of COVID-19 positive patients.
“Our team of close contact tracers are working shifts seven days a week, 12 or more hours a day to track down possible close contacts of confirmed COVID-19 patients,” Green says. “Because of the Contact Tracing Team’s hard work, there is an impressive synergy between Marine Corps operational units here [Marine Corps Installations East], and local and state health department officials to thoroughly investigate each case.”
NMCCL Preventive Medicine has hosted a series of contact tracing courses over the past five months. The most recent course, held on August 5, brought together medical professionals assigned to both Navy and Marine Corps units, Marine Corps Community Services, Child Development Centers, and Department of Defense Education Activity Schools. The class breaks down what Preventive Medicine has learned about COVID-19 up until present day and their novel, yet effective, process for tracking close contacts. Class participants can then take these methods back to their respective unit or organization to apply to their daily COVID-19 prevention routines.
“What we are learning is that if you have COVID-19, you could potentially infect an average of two people, then those two people could infect four people and so on,” says Green. “People assume because they aren’t showing symptoms right away, they don’t have it. However, we are seeing that the incubation period for COVID is two to 14 days, and by day six or seven after exposure–boom. That’s often when those symptoms are hitting, or the symptoms are so mild the person may believe it is just allergies or the common cold.”
In order to keep close contact tracing operational each week, a team of Marines from II Marine Expeditionary Force and Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune were trained by Preventive Medicine to aid the Contact Tracing Team. Each morning, shifts begin in the same manner– dozens upon dozens of phone calls.
“We have six or seven Sailors and Marines working each shift, and these are the guidelines and questions we use when calling possible close contacts,” explains Hospitalman Corpsman Demetria Garvin as she pulls up a collage of colorful charts and lists on her computer screen. “We speak directly with the patient, and then we start contacting individuals that the patient tells us about. We inform them that they have been identified as a close contact and to self-quarantine and monitor for symptoms.”
Garvin explains that identified close contacts are then called every 24 to 48 hours for symptom checks. When asked what defines a close contact, Garvin is immediately able to pull up the most current information on COVID-19 epidemiology.
“Were you within six feet for at least 15 minutes or longer of someone who has COVID-19? Have you had direct physical contact with someone who has COVID-19?” Garvin communicates a few of the questions asked of potential close contacts.
If a person is identified as a close contact of a COVID-positive patient, Contact Tracers then convey the symptoms to monitor. The individual will be advised to remain home for 14 days to watch for current or possible development of symptoms. Close contacts are given information on the NMCCL COVID-19 Phone Help Line, the Active Duty COVID-19 Screening Site, and the NMCCL Acute Respiratory Clinic. Should they notice symptoms, the close contact can confer with a medical professional about further testing, if necessary.
“We want to surround positive cases, isolate them, and quarantine their close contacts. The quicker we can do this, the more effective we can be in stopping an outbreak,” Green elaborates. “What we are seeing is that we can’t necessarily control cases from happening, but we can control the cluster that comes from cases.”
Green describes contact tracing as a sort of “box it in” process. In four steps, personnel are surrounding a COVID case by testing a patient, isolating the sick, finding close contacts, and having patients quarantine 14 days from the date of exposure.
“So far, we have been effective at controlling the explosive spread of the virus that we have seen occur throughout other parts of the world and nation,” Green explains. “We attribute part of that success to early and effective contact tracing and getting close contacts into quarantine quickly before they themselves become infected and subsequently infect others. It is a tedious and often an imperfect process, but we have undoubtedly seen these efforts slow the spread of the virus locally.”
After more than 100 days spent contact tracing and refining methods, the Contact Tracing Team finds what they call avoidable traits, or the "Big Four", in not contracting COVID-19:
1. If you are sick, stay home.
2. Avoid large gatherings, especially with people you know to have or possibly have COVID-19.
3. If you were a known close contact of someone with COVID-19, self-quarantine for 14 days from the last exposure date.
4. If you have a COVID-19 test taken and are waiting for results, isolate at home until you get the results.
Each day, the NMCCL Contact Tracing Team reports numbers of positive cases and other pertinent information to local health departments. While COVID-19 will not likely disappear soon, Green stresses that the Contact Tracing Team is not only helping to “box in” cases, but to expand knowledge of how to prevent falling ill with COVID-19.
“By having this contact tracing process that works, this rapid response is mitigating further propagation of the disease,” says Green. “By doing well at contact tracing, we can flatten our local curve and keep more people from becoming sick.”
What counts as a close contact? Check out these points from the NMCCL Contact Tracing Team:
• You were within six feet of someone who has COVID-19 for at least 15 minutes.
• You provided care at home to someone who is sick with COVID-19.
• You had direct physical contact with that person (touched, kissed, or hugged).
• You shared eating or drinking utensils.
• They sneezed, coughed, or somehow got respiratory droplets on you.
| Date Taken: | 08.13.2020 |
| Date Posted: | 08.13.2020 16:17 |
| Story ID: | 375946 |
| Location: | CAMP LEJEUNE, NC, US |
| Web Views: | 345 |
| Downloads: | 3 |
This work, Close contact tracing team on frontlines of COVID-19 pandemic care, by Riley Eversull, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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