Mercy Health Foundation Irvine

Associates helped provide thermometers for COVID screenings, keeping patients and staff safe

When donations were used to purchase forehead thermometers for Mercy Health — Marcum and Wallace Hospital, it was to make life easier for the nursing staff. Now, those thermometers could be saving the lives of healthcare workers and other patients.

The thermometers quickly and accurately take a person’s temperature using an infrared scanner to measure the temporal artery in the forehead. They were meant to be used by nursing staff on routine checks of patients’ vital signs. With extra precautions needed now during the COVID-19 pandemic, they are also being used to screen staff and visitors as they enter the building.

Chelsea Honchell is a registered nurse at the hospital and wants donors to know how much the thermometers have helped them.

“The forehead thermometers have helped us out at our temperature station, to screen people before they come into the building,” she said. “This way we can better protect ourselves and our patients. It has definitely made a big impact in helping us through the COVID-19 pandemic.”

But it didn’t take a crisis for nurses like Chelsea to see how valuable the forehead thermometers can be.

“Not only has it helped us during the COVID-19 crisis, but they are very important even during normal times,” Chelsea said. “They just help everything go a little quicker when you are getting vital signs on multiple patients. They are very, very appreciated!”