(Greenwood, S.C., April 28, 2020) Our primary goal continues to be the safety and care of our team members and patients making Self Regional Healthcare the safest place possible to receive care.

As you all know, South Carolina has chose to reopen department stores; furniture, clothing, and sporting goods stores; flea markets, florists, bookstores, music stores and such. According to Governor McMaster’s order, these businesses will be required to practice social distancing and the occupancy in each store must be limited to five customers per 1,000 square feet of retail space. However, even with these social distancing measures in place, the increased retail activity will very likely lead to more opportunities for COVID-19 to spread in our community. The executive order is certainly good news for our struggling local businesses, but will also require extra caution on everyone’s part in order to avoid a surge of new infections. To take our precautions at Self Regional Healthcare up another level, we have now begun requiring all patients and visitors entering the hospital, or any of our facilities, to wear a mask. We encourage the public to be prepared when arriving at Self Regional Medical Center or any of our physician practices to wear the same type mask you would wear to the grocery store or out in the community. Home-made cloth masks are perfectly adequate. If you do not have a mask, we will issue you one before allowing you in our facility.

Like other hospitals around the state, we also are beginning a gradual return to time sensitive elective procedures and surgeries at Self Regional Healthcare. Our physician leadership has been working deliberately on preparations so that we can resume surgeries as safely and efficiently as possible. The restarting of time sensitive elective surgery will be a phased approach, here’s a summary: Beginning May 4 we will restart lower-risk procedures that do not have lengthy inpatient stays, and that are unlikely to require patients to transfer to a rehab facility. If we are maintaining a stable supply of PPE and still have not experienced an unanticipated surge of COVID-19 patients, on May 11 we’ll begin slightly more complex procedures that involve larger clinical teams. Again, if that phase goes well, our PPE supply remains stable and we don’t have an unanticipated surge of COVID-19 patients, on May 18 we will resume more complex procedures, like total joint replacements. We encourage patients who are awaiting procedures or surgery to speak with your physician or surgeon about the most appropriate time to schedule your case. Of course, all of these dates are subject to change, depending on PPE availability and the volume of COVID-19 cases in our service area.

For all Self Regional Healthcare coronavirus updates, visit https://www.selfregional.org/coronavirus