Dr. Gabbe talks about being prepared for the upcoming flu season.
Hi! Be prepared. It’s advice we’ve all heard often throughout our lives. Our parents told us to be prepared for school, our teachers told us to be prepared for the big test, traffic reporters tell us to be prepared for delays and we tell ourselves to be prepared for everything from a big meeting to the big game.
I want to talk about being prepared today – prepared for the upcoming flu season. Over the past several months, many people from across the Medical Center have been preparing for the upcoming flu season. We are prepared for the typical seasonal flu and also for H1N1.
That preparation has included monitoring information from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and working with the University and the City of Columbus to prepare for the influenza season and how it may impact our University, our health system and our community. We have plans in place and are continuing to refine these plans as we get closer to flu season.
We all have a role in this preparation and one of the most important roles we have is to help prevent the spread of the flu. Washing our hands often, covering coughs and sneezes with our arm and not our hands and staying home when we are ill are all ways we can prevent the spread of the flu.
Another thing we can all do is get our flu vaccine. Our goal at the Medical Center is 100 percent compliance with getting the seasonal flu shot. We’ll begin offering the vaccine here in October and you will have many opportunities to get this free vaccine. You will begin to see information soon on dates and locations for flu shots. And, we will keep you updated when we know more about the availability of the H1N1 vaccination and its distribution here at the Medical Center.
Your safety and the safety of our patients and all those who visit the Medical Center is our number one priority. We are developing a special Flu Update site on OneSource and it will be live in the next few weeks to provide you with information and tools as well as links to resources from the CDC. You can find information now by using the key word Flu in the search engine on OneSource.
You will receive email updates regarding the flu from a special Influenza Update email address that has been created. We are working to streamline the communication you receive from the Medical Center and the University so that it is easier for you to stay informed. You can also use this email address to ask questions. It is Influenza Update@osumc.edu. You can find it in the Outlook address book.
Finally, I’d encourage you to take some time to make sure that you are personally prepared as we head into flu season. Have you shared the tips to prevent the spread of the flu to your family and friends? Do you have a plan in place to care for a child or loved one who is sick and may require a substantial amount of time at home? Do you have a thermometer at home for taking temperatures to help in determining if you or a family member might have the flu. Taking time to think through plans like this will benefit you and your family in the months ahead.
The community looks to us to be experts and to be prepared for any health situation that might arise. I’m confident that with your help, we’ll continue to be just that.
Well, have a great week.