Dear Valued Patients,
We hope this letter finds you and your family in good health. Our community has been through a lot over the last few months, and all of us are looking forward to resuming our normal habits and routines. While many things have changed, one thing has remained the same: our commitment to your safety.
We want to inform you about the infection control procedures that we are going to follow in our practice to keep patients and staff safe with the reopening stages currently set by the government authorities.
Our office follows infection control recommendations made by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). We follow the activities of these agencies so that we are up-to-date on any new rulings or guidance that may be issued. We do this to make sure that our infection control procedures are current and adhere to each agencies' recommendations.
You may see some changes when it is time for your next appointment. We made these changes to help protect our patients and staff. The following protocol will take place:
Our office will communicate with you beforehand to ask some screening questions. You'll be asked those same questions again when you are in the office.
Any case whose symptoms may suggest COVID-19 infection or exposure will be offered a telehealth appointment first to prevent exposure in our offices.
We will have hand sanitizer that we will ask you to use when you enter the office. You will find these in the reception area, exam rooms, and other places in the office for you to use as needed.
Our staff will continue the use of face masks and frequent hand washing. We require parents and patients age 2 and older to continue the use of face masks as required by Duval County and recommend frequent hand washing as well while in the office.
Appointments will be managed to allow for social distancing between patients. We will designate sick and well check rooms in each office. That might mean that you're offered fewer options for scheduling your appointment.
We will encourage well checks to be scheduled in the morning, and sick visits to be scheduled in the afternoon. However, due to the unpredictable nature of the sick patient, this might not apply in certain conditions (ex. uncontrolled asthma attack, respiratory distress, etc) and patients may have to be seen in the first spot available.
Patients will wait in their cars until the time of the appointment. Patients will call us once in the parking lot, and will be taken straight to their exam rooms to minimize waiting time in the waiting room.
Our office hours will continue to be 8:30am-5:00pm.
We look forward to seeing you again and are happy to answer any questions you may have about the steps we take to keep you, and every patient, safe in our practice. To make an appointment, please call our office at 904-260-2565.
Thank you for being our patient! We value your trust and loyalty and look forward to continuing to serve our patients, neighbors and friends.
Sincerely,
Your Providers at Beaches Pediatrics:
Jorge Rivera, M.D.
Joanna Walker, D.O.
Jamie Kanehl, A.P.R.N.