New guidelines for brain death; Cleveland Clinic masking again; Clinics anxious for COVID vaccines - Morning Medical Update

New guidelines for brain death

New guidelines on determining brain death have been updated for the first time in a decade. Updated criteria offer new targets for blood pressure and body temperature and does not require consent before preforming the evaluation. The goal of these latest rules is to set a national standard for declaring brain death.

Cleveland Clinic masking again

The Cleveland Clinic has required caregivers and visitors to start wearing masks again, beginning next week. The Clinic stopped requiring masks in April of this year, saying that masking may return this fall. At local Cleveland hospital chains MetroHealth and University Hospitals, masking is still optional.

Clinics anxious for COVID vaccines

Many community health centers across the country are still waiting for the latest shipment of COVID vaccines. Cahaba Medical Care, which has 26 clinics across Alabama, hasn’t received a single dose. Because these clinics rely on government funding, they are unable to cover to costs of the vaccines on their own. “We are actually waiting with bated breath,” Veronica Ford, a nursing manager at Cahaba Medical Center said in an interview. “We are checking daily to see if the state has received their supply so that we can get ours.”