{"id":6552,"date":"2020-03-24T12:55:02","date_gmt":"2020-03-24T18:55:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/drbenke.wpengine.com\/?p=6552"},"modified":"2023-06-27T17:10:15","modified_gmt":"2023-06-27T23:10:15","slug":"covid-19-a-health-and-safety-update","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/drbenke.com\/covid-19-a-health-and-safety-update\/","title":{"rendered":"COVID-19: A Health and Safety Update"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Like you, the staff at Benke Ear Nose &amp; Throat Clinic is closely monitoring the conditions surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><b>As of\u00a0 May 4, our office will begin seeing patients in the office. Our clinic hours are 8:00am-4:30pm, Monday through Thursday, 8:00am-12:00pm on Friday.\u00a0 We are reachable by phone (817) 641-3750 or by email, patientinfo@drbenke.com.\u00a0 We continue to encourage NEW and existing patients to consider appointments via Telehealth for qualifying cases.\u00a0 Hearing aid patients that need service, repairs or supplies are asked to call the office for instructions on curbside drop off and pick up or to make an appointment.\u00a0 We are doing our best to continue to help flatten the curve and reduce the risk of exposure to our staff and patients.\u00a0 The following are some measures we have implemented in order to safely see patients in the office:<\/b><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>All patients seen in the office will be required to answer a Covid-19 symptoms screening checklist.\u00a0 Anyone that may report any of the following symptoms and\/or believe they may have recently been exposed to Covid-19, may be asked to reschedule their appointment: fever, cough, shortness of breath, chills, sore throat, loss of taste or smell, muscle pain, headache, diarrhea.\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><b>When an appointment is scheduled any New patient paperwork or update paperwork for existing patients must be completed PRIOR to the day of your appointment.\u00a0 We are happy to send these to you electronically or you may come by the office to pick them up.\u00a0\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<li><strong>Anyone entering the building will be required to wear a face mask.\u00a0 Cloth or paper is acceptable if you do not have an N95 rated mask.\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>To continue social distancing measures we are asking that only the patient being seen come for their scheduled appointment.\u00a0 We will allow a family member to be present under certain circumstances, but they will be subject to the same safety precautions and screenings as the patient.\u00a0 Minors may only have one legal guardian accompanying them to their appointment.\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Our waiting room is closed until further notice. Please call our office when you arrive and wait in your car until we are ready to see you.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><b>Hand sanitizing stations are located throughout the building and we encourage patients to utilize them when hand washing is not available.\u00a0 We do not recommend wearing gloves to your appointment and you will be asked to remove them at the door and use hand sanitizer.\u00a0\u00a0<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>We are committed to providing the safest and best care possible to our patients and have also increased our cleaning practices.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><b>\u00a0<\/b><em><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you believe you need immediate care, call our office at (817) 641-3750. If you experience an emergency, please dial 9-1-1.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">COVID-19 is more contagious than other similar upper respiratory illnesses, yet there are steps you can take to protect yourself and others from infection.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In your daily life, we implore you to practice frequent handwashing, and avoid unnecessary travel, activities, or person-to-person contact. For more information on these recommendations, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/coronavirus\/2019-nCoV\/index.html\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">visit the CDC\u2019s COVID-19 resource page.<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">While this is a challenging time, we believe we all play a vital role in promoting community health in North Texas. Thank you for your patience and understanding as we ensure our clinic remains a safe, healthy environment for you to receive the highest quality treatment.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Like you, the staff at Benke Ear Nose &amp; Throat Clinic is closely monitoring the conditions surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic.\u00a0 As of\u00a0 May 4, our office will begin seeing patients in the office. Our clinic hours are 8:00am-4:30pm, Monday through Thursday, 8:00am-12:00pm on Friday.\u00a0 We are reachable by phone (817) 641-3750 or by email, patientinfo@drbenke.com.\u00a0&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/drbenke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6552"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/drbenke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/drbenke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drbenke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drbenke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6552"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/drbenke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6552\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/drbenke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6552"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drbenke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6552"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drbenke.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6552"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}