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MADELIA -- "Community members have been anxiously awaiting the COVID-19 vaccine for months, and we are happy to announce that we can now start vaccinating our older patients," said Madelia Community Hospital & Clinic (MCHC) CEO Jeff Mengenhausen.
MCHC is supposed to be allocated limited quantities of the vaccine each week from the State of Minnesota, but doesn't know how much vaccine will be supplied until three to four days before it arrives. This makes it difficult to schedule vaccination clinics. So rather than doing a lottery system, MCHC will start vaccinating patients based on age. MCHC's oldest patients will be contacted first via phone. If they choose to be vaccinated, an appointment time will be scheduled for them. MCHC will continue down the patient list until it gets to those that have just turned 65.
"Our oldest patients are the most at risk of getting a severe case of COVID-19, so they seemed like the best population to start with," said Mengenhausen. "The vaccine coming in each week is far less than the demand. With this limited quantity, we could not take vaccine appointments effectively or efficiently, and many of our older patients can not be contacted via our patient portal or by social media. So we made the decision to dedicate some of our staff time to calling our patients and speaking to each one directly."