Warren General Hospital continues to test for COVID-19 and make reports to the Pennsylvania Department of Health.

“Warren General Hospital reports to the Pennsylvania Department of Health three times daily, at least,” Medical Director Dr. Keith Price said. “Our emergency preparedness nurse does it three times daily and our infection control and compliance have to report daily.”

There haven’t been any new cases to report since Wednesday, March 25.

“As of yesterday, we had checked 165 COVID swab tests,” Price said Tuesday. “All that we have received back for Warren Countians have been negative except that one from three weeks ago.”

“We currently have no COVID-positive patients in the hospital,” he said. “We have two for whom we are awaiting testing, which is about average. It takes two to five days to get test results, which is frustrating.”

The hospital shares information like that as well as its preparations and equipment with the Department of Health.

The department has a new hospital dashboard where visitors can find information about the situations in each county.

Sometimes, some of the data doesn’t seem to match.

“I am and have been baffled by the numbers that pop up on that dashboard when you click on Warren County,” Price said. “We have more than 9 med/surg beds available.”

“We have 10 ventilators, none currently in use,” he said.

The dashboard reports six ventilators. “Of course, these numbers change daily, but it seems like the numbers were the same on the dashboard when I checked it a number of days ago,” Price said.

Part of the reason the state keeps information about available equipment relates to a mandate by Gov. Tom Wolf that hospitals be prepared to share their equipment with hospitals with higher demand.

“Gov. Wolf did send out a ‘decree’ that we have to report our personal protective equipment stock, ventilators, etc, so that resources can be used most effectively in Pennsylvania,” Price said. “On one hand, I feel that is a good thing – getting the supplies to the areas who need them most.”

“On the other hand, knowing how the wheels of government sometimes grind very slowly, I worry that, if any of our PPE or ventilators were relocated, we might not get them back when we need them,” he said.

Although the hospital has only had one positive case, and that person is being treated elsewhere, there are plans for a surge of patients.

“I feel that WGH has a good contingency plan for a surge, and even some ‘crisis’ planning if things were to worsen more,” Price said. “I feel incredibly blessed that we have seen essentially none of this scourge thus far. I think we will get some cases in the next several weeks, but hopefully not overwhelmingly so.”