UPMC Northwest received its first shipment of the Pfizer vaccine for the coronavirus at 9:50 a.m. Thursday.
“It’s a precious cargo,” said Katelin Speer, director of operations and a pharmacist at the hospital, as she waited for the shipment to arrive.
It arrived via a UPS delivery vehicle driven by Doug Baumgarten, of Seneca. After hoisting the rather nondescript, 60-pound, white cardboard box out of the vehicle, Baumgarten carried it a short distance into the loading dock area of the hospital.
“Good, it’s here. That was special,” said Baumgarten, as he climbed back into his vehicle.
In a warehouse-like setting, the three women carefully pried open the box and checked a GPS and temperature tracker label on the contents to ensure the vaccine was kept at the correct temperature during the trip.
They pulled aside packing and pulled a small square box out of the container. Lifting the lid, Speer uncovered rows of blue, frozen vials of the vaccine.
The contents were placed back into the box and whisked off to one of two deep freezers inside the hospital.
The Pfizer vaccine requires storage at minus 60 to minus 80 degrees Celsius, said Speer, and the hospital has a pair of freezers that are capable of providing that.
Vaccinations coming
The delivered vaccine provides 975 first-time doses, enough to cover the entire hospital staff. There could be more doses since the vials, listed as providing five doses, are by design a little fuller. Speer said it could amount to about 20% more vaccine doses being available.
“This is specifically for the hospital staff,” said Speer. “We were very fortunate to get this many doses.”
The vaccine will be administered “probably Monday or Tuesday,” said Speer. The Pfizer vaccine requires two injections. The second one is set for 21 days later.
“The shipment to us came directly from the (drug) manufacturer,” explained Speer, who has been overseeing what she described as an “unprecedented effort” to procure and receive the vaccine.
“While we’re coordinating with the (UPMC) system, each hospital was dealing directly with the Department of Health,” she said. “We needed to keep it streamlined to eliminate any stopping points. All of it has been our focus. We’ve never done one like this.”
Hospital is busy
UPMC Northwest has seen a surge in COVID-19 patients over the past several weeks. The in-patient census of COVID-diagnosed individuals has been in a daily range of 15 to 30.
In coping with the onslaught, the hospital has expanded its capacity by taking steps to reconfigure what had been single-patient rooms into two-patient rooms and more.
Brian Durniok, president of UPMC Northwest, said while the 170-bed hospital has been “very close” to capacity, no one who needs medical care has been turned away.
The hospital is managing the hefty caseload with adequate staff, sufficient supplies, expansion of patient rooms and more, he said.
