Taylorville Memorial Hospital issued the following announcement on April 22.
At-home kits with monitoring equipment are helping Memorial Health System health care providers quickly spot potential complications for dozens of central Illinois residents who are recovering at home from COVID-19 symptoms.
More than 70 patients who were tested for COVID-19 at Memorial’s respiratory screening clinic this month at 2950 S. Sixth St. in Springfield received kits from Memorial Home Medical Equipment with devices to monitor blood-oxygen levels, heartbeat, temperature and lung function.
“The kits give us some more insight to ensure that patients’ symptoms don’t worsen,” Kimberly Paskiewicz, Memorial Health System administrator of special services, said.
The kits include a peak-flow meter to measure lung function, a spirometer to exercise the lungs, an inhaler, a battery-powered pulse oximeter and, for patients who don’t have one at home, a thermometer, according to Lori Valentine, system director for durable medical goods.
Along with the kits, patients receive an instruction pamphlet with space to record equipment readings.
The kits already have assisted health care providers following up by phone in deciding whether patients needed care in a hospital or could safely continue to recover at home, Paskiewicz said.
Some patients also received the at-home kits after being evaluated for mild to moderate COVID-19 symptoms in the emergency departments of hospitals operated by the health system in Springfield, Decatur, Jacksonville, Taylorville and Lincoln, she said.
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