According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention nearly three dozen U.S. hospitals are now designated as Ebola treatment centers and, as expected, Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas isn't among them.
Presbyterian Hospital treated the first three cases of Ebola diagnosed in the United States, including Liberian Thomas Duncan and two nurses, Nina Pham and Amber Vinson, who treated him. Duncan died from the disease Oct. 8; Pham and Vinson recovered from the virus after receiving treatment at other hospitals.
On Oct. 22 Texas Gov. Rick Perry announced Texas would create two biocontainment facilities that could treat future Ebola patients — The Methodist Campus for Continuing Care in Richardson and The University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston. The Richardson hospital is a collaboration between the Methodist Hospital System, the Parkland Hospital System and the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.
"Each hospital with an Ebola treatment center has been assessed on-site by a CDC Rapid Ebola Preparedness (REP) team. The CDC REP team is staffed with experts in all aspects of caring for a patient with Ebola, including staff training, infection control, personal protective equipment (PPE) use, and details such as handling and management of the trash from the patient's room. As of December 1st, CDC has conducted REP team assessments in over 50 hospitals in 15 states and Washington, D.C.," the CDC said in a statement.
Most of the hospitals are clustered in metropolitan areas and on the East Coast where many African travelers first arrive when traveling to North America. More Ebola treatment centers are expected to be designated in the coming weeks to provide wider geographic coverage, the CDC said.
"Hospitals with Ebola treatment centers have been designated by state health officials to serve as treatment facilities for Ebola patients based on a collaborative decision with local health authorities and the hospital administration," the CDC said in a statement Tuesday. "Ebola treatment centers are staffed, equipped and have been assessed to have current capabilities, training and resources to provide the complex treatment necessary to care for a person with Ebola while minimizing risk to health care workers."
More than 80 percent of travelers entering the United States from Ebola-stricken countries will now live within 200 miles of an Ebola treatment center. While they are self-monitoring for symptoms of exposure, travelers communicate every day with health officials for 21 days during the Ebola virus' incubation period.
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"As long as Ebola is spreading in West Africa, we must prepare for the possibility of additional cases in the United States," said CDC Director Tom Frieden. "We are implementing and constantly strengthening multiple levels of protection, including increasing the number of hospitals that have the training and capabilities to manage the complex care of an Ebola patient. These hospitals have worked hard to rigorously assess their capabilities and train their staff."
The facilities announced Tuesday supplement the three national biocontainment facilities that treated Pham, Vinson and other Ebola patients, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Emory University Hospital and the Nebraska Medical Center.
The 35 hospitals with Ebola treatment centers to date are:
Kaiser Oakland Medical Center, Oakland, California.
Kaiser South Sacramento Medical Center, Sacramento, California.
University of California Davis Medical Center, Sacramento, California.
University of California San Francisco Medical Center, San Francisco.
Emory University Hospital, Atlanta.
Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago.
Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Chicago.
Rush University Medical Center, Chicago.
University of Chicago Medical Center, Chicago.
Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore.
University of Maryland Medical Center, Baltimore.
National Institutes of Health Clinical Center, Bethesda, Maryland.
Allina Health's Unity Hospital, Fridley, Minnesota.
Children's Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota, St. Paul, Minnesota.
Mayo Clinic Hospital, Rochester, Minnesota.
University of Minnesota Medical Center, Minneapolis.
Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha.
Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital, New Brunswick, New Jersey.
North Shore System LIJ/Glen Cove Hospital, Glen Cove, New York.
Montefiore Medical Center, New York.
New York-Presbyterian/Allen Hospital, New York.
Bellevue Hospital Center, New York.
The Mount Sinai Hospital, New York.
Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Philadelphia.
Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.
University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, Texas.
Methodist Richardson Medical Center, Richardson, Texas.
University of Virginia Medical Center, Charlottesville, Virginia.
Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center, Richmond, Virginia.
Children's Hospital of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Froedtert Hospital, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
University of Wisconsin Hospital, Madison, Wisconsin.
MedStar Washington Hospital Center, Washington, D.C.
Children's National Medical Center, Washington, D.C.
George Washington University Hospital, Washington, D.C.
