Photo By Staff Sgt. Tinisha Mellein | (from left to right) Cpt. Aris Banaag, TF Medical Operations Officer in-Charge, Lui...... read more read more
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Hawaii National Guard Soldiers and Airmen, along with Department of Health (DOH) representatives, work together to mitigate the spread of COVID by conducting contact mapping at a call center set up at University of Hawaii Maui College (UHMC), Sept. 3, 2020.
Various news outlets made a visit to the college to see the new call center and report on the partnership between the Hawaii National Guard, Department of Health, and University of Maui College.
“UH Maui College provided us an operation center with all the necessary equipment like computers, printers, and phone lines, where we can be centrally located in partnership with department of health,” said Cpt. Aris Banaag, current Task Force Medical Operations officer in-charge. “We want to thank UH Maui College, Chancellor Lui Hokoana, and the many staff and faculty that helped put this together, so we can get the job done efficiently.”
Lui Hokoana, Chancellor of UHMC, was instrumental in establishing a contact mapping operation center at the university.
“There was a call from the department of health and the mayor to find a space where we could set up a call center for the contact mapping so we looked and we had the appropriate space to do it here at UHMC,” said Hokoana. “We want all of our students to learn the importance of supporting the community so we can use this as an opportunity to demonstrate what that looks like.”
Soldiers are responsible for making daily monitoring calls to conduct health screenings and symptom checks with people in quarantine after coming in contact with a positive COVID19 patient. Soldiers are making in upwards of 200 calls a day and as they feel more comfortable they have progressed to even doing initial notification, which lets a person know they may have come in contact with someone with COVID19 and explain to them about quarantine and what symptoms to keep an eye out for.
“If a lead disease investigator gets a list of 13 contacts they can get assistance from the Soldiers to help make those initial calls, and it is a huge help for them,” said Heidi Taogoshi, R.N. with Maui Department of Health. “I don’t know how we would do it without the National Guards help, if we didn’t have them here I think we would have to prioritize those at highest risk, but having them here allows us to really cast that wide net and contact as many people as we can.”
The contact mapping call center is in operation seven days a week with 20 National Guard members trained and rotating work days. The Department of Health is going to be hiring twelve temporary hires to bring on board September 8, 2020. These are people that completed a contact mapping course that was put out by the University of Hawaii and they will be trained and able to help with investigations as well.
“Covid mapping has been a priority given to us by our leadership, so we our putting forward our best effort to this mission,” said Lt. Col. Cesar Pudiquet, Task Force Maui Commander. “I would also like to thank the University of Hawaii Maui College, this partnership has been a win for everybody."
The National Guard is willing and ready to assist the county of Maui to stop the spread of COVID19. Contact mapping helps to protect the community by identifying, quarantining, and monitoring persons who have close contact with a positive COVID19 case.
| Date Taken: | 09.03.2020 |
| Date Posted: | 06.17.2021 04:21 |
| Story ID: | 378505 |
| Location: | KAHULUI, HI, US |
| Web Views: | 58 |
| Downloads: | 1 |
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