PERU – Illinois Valley Community Hospital administered its 1,000th test for the novel coronavirus over the Independence Day weekend.
Tommy Hobbs, IVCH chief executive officer, says there’s good news in knowing that small downstate hospitals such as IVCH haven’t been overrun with coronavirus patients, as some observers had feared might happen.
Of 1052 tests administered at IVCH through July 6, only 15 patients tested positive, leaving 999 patients with negative results and 38 patients still waiting for their test results to come back. That means just 1.4 percent of the patients tested for covid-19 at IVCH have tested positive for the disease.
Hobbs is encouraged that the number of new coronavirus cases statewide seems to be trending downward. In a message to IVCH employees last week, he said “the overall trend continues to be down from the peak, but we appear to have hit a plateau.”
Stringent safety precautions are still in effect at the hospital even though elective surgeries have resumed and visitor restrictions have been eased somewhat.
“Everyone who enters IVCH will be asked to wear a face mask into the foreseeable future because the health and safety of our patients and staff comes first,” says Hobbs.
