Mask messaging muddied at hospital: epidemiologist

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This article was published 12/07/2022 (1213 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

After months of public health messages urging people to upgrade their single-layer masks for better protection against COVID-19, a Winnipeg epidemiologist was surprised to be asked to remove her KN95 in favour of a surgical mask upon entering a city hospital Tuesday.

“I felt like a) that’s a waste on the landfill side and b) I was a little confused because we’ve done so much to try to work together to support (the understanding that) better protection masks are N95 or KN95 versus surgical or cloth,” said Cynthia Carr.

“We really worked hard for that messaging, and so I was surprised in the hospital setting to be asked to remove the KN95 and to just be given a surgical mask.”

When asked about the masking policy in hospitals and health-care facilities, a Shared Health spokesperson said it hasn’t changed, and people are allowed to keep their own masks on underneath the provided surgical ones.

That wasn’t communicated during her visit, said Carr, an independent epidemiologist and consultant who has been working throughout the COVID-19 pandemic to emphasize best practices for infection control.

Carr said she understands staff who screened her at the entrance prior to her outpatient appointment were just doing their job, but she questioned whether improved policies, training or communication are necessary.

It doesn’t make sense for people to throw out their N95 masks upon entry, Carr said, especially since most will have put on a new one specifically for their hospital visit, adding she understands the logic behind providing everyone with a new mask.

Carr declined to name the hospital, saying she didn’t want to disparage anyone.

“I think it’s just an opportunity for a reminder and maybe just an evaluation of training or policies about how to best protect people in these settings.”

Ideally, people should be provided with KN95 masks at hospitals, and if that’s not affordable, they should be allowed to put on a fresh mask over their own, Carr said, adding proper masking is particularly important considering a surge of BA.5 transmission in many other jurisdictions.

The more contagious and immune-evasive Omicron sub-variant could be as infectious as measles, emerging research is showing.

“It goes together. Right now, with those potential threats circulating — and we’ve seen other countries go through it — it’s just a chance to remind ourselves about what we’ve learned and keep those tools going. Where do we need to continue to invest and where might we be able to ease up? And I would just say in the hospital setting, it would have been ideal if everybody was offered the KN95,” she said.

Shared Health’s mask policy was issued in December.

“To ensure the protection of everyone in our health-care facilities, including our vulnerable patient population, medical-grade procedure masks are required to be worn and have been provided upon entry to visitors since late last year. This ensures the mask is clean, new and confirmed to meet the respiratory protection standards of a medical-grade procedure mask,” Shared Health stated.

“The policy was implemented due to an increase in the number of visitors wearing non-medically certified KN95 or similar respirators when arriving at our sites. Visitors still wanting to wear non-medically certified respirators are required to place a medical-grade procedure mask over top of their respirator.”

katie.may@freepress.mb.ca