Since mid-March, the entire IU Northwest community has been reevaluating, recalibrating, and rethinking nearly every routine in their lives because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Asked to work, teach, and learn from home for everyone’s safety, faculty, staff, and students had to quickly adjust to a new way of life for just about everything from A to Zoom.

That’s been the case outside of course instruction as well. There may be shortages of personal protective equipment (PPE), but no shortage of folks wanting to help others on the frontlines. Whether it’s sending pizzas to night shift hospital workers, donating their PPE stock to nearby hospitals, or sewing masks in basement crafts rooms like members of our own Schools of Nursing and Dental Education have done, IU Northwest’s community of faculty, staff, students, and alumni are joining the effort to address COVID-19-related challenges across the region. Here are a few examples of how they’re stepping up.

Masks for NWI health care workers

Megan Foster is pursuing a degree in Applied Health Science with a health administration specialization. She has aspirations of pursuing a graduate or doctoral degree within the health sciences to complement her clinical experience. She is also one of the heroes on the front lines of the COVID-19 crisis.

As a surgical assistant for both Great Lakes Surgical Suites and Franciscan Health, specializing in orthopedic surgery, Foster has temporarily been reassigned to work only with emergency cases.

Concerned about an impending shortage of PPE for health care workers, Foster reached out to the surgical director of Franciscan Health to recommend the utilization of surgical wraps to make masks, as this is being done around the country. In doing so, she received an assignment, to begin recruiting volunteers to start the project. She wasted no time in jumping right in with both feet.

“On my pursuit to acquire volunteers from the Valparaiso community,” Foster says, “I was connected with the people of Masks for NWI Healthcare Workers, who took me under their wing and shared their volunteer network. To date, we have produced around 5,000 H600 masks, and over 8,000 cloth masks with H600 filters.”

“I cannot believe the support and outpouring of love from the NWI community,” Foster told one of her instructors, Dr. Linda Delunas in an email, “If you have Facebook, you can see what we are doing on Masks for NWI Healthcare Workers. It’s so neat!”

The organizations founders are Sha-Ron Jackson-Johnson, currently of Indiana Surgical Associates, and Stephanie Bryant, a family physician affiliated with St. Mary Medical Center in Hobart.

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Rising to the challenge of constant change, chaos

Three of the most hard-working IU Northwest alumni on the front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic are colleagues at the Griffith Police Department.

Gregory Mance (‘07, MPA; ’99, B.A., criminal justice) is Chief of Police for the Griffith Police Department. Inside IUN caught up with him recently to ask about what his role has been like during these unprecedented times. He told us that like most in the field of public safety, he is somewhat accustomed to living in a state of constant change and sometimes even chaos. But these times have taught him to become even more fluid in his professional responses and duties.

“From the need to rapidly procure scarce PPE for my officers, to the extreme altering of the everyday policies and procedures of my agency, to helping facilitate a pop-up community food distribution site for those in need, and much more, the needs of my agency, officers, and community members have quickly changed in a matter of just a few days,” Mance said.

Mance has the pleasure of working with two more IU Northwest alumni, Erica Rios, who earned a master’s degree in social work, and Paul Sines, who holds a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice.

Rios was the first police social worker in the state when she hired on with the Griffith PD in 2018. She said the crisis has brought to the forefront a large population of folks who need help. Rios and a colleague have personally called about 900 seniors since the crisis began, a task which she says opened her eyes to how vulnerable many in her community are.

Rios has been helping connect seniors with resources to help keep them safe. She also discovered that those struggling with substance abuse have the added challenge of having to find support by phone or online.

“In many ways, I think this crisis is going to change us as a society forever,” Rios said. “The sudden need for telehealth services and delivery services, for example, are some things that I hope remain after this crisis mitigates. Many of the challenges we’re seeing in Griffith were uncovered by this crisis. I hope to use this as a learning tool to be able to continue helping our most vulnerable residents.”

Paul Sines is a veteran patrol sergeant who also served as an IU Northwest cadet and officer. As a supervisor, he has a heightened sense of his officers’ safety and carefully weighs the risks of sending officers on calls versus taking reports over the phone.

“We try to speak to everyone outside to ensure social distancing and reduce exposures to our officers,” he said. “If we have to go into a residence, we take the proper precautions.”

The colleagues acknowledged that this pandemic quickly forced them to change the way they conduct their jobs day-to-day.  From socially distanced lunch breaks in patrol cars to a heightened sense of protection for all, those who protect and serve in Griffith may have changed some practices permanently.

Sines remains optimistic.

“If we all work together we will return to normalcy,” he said, “in the meantime, spend time with your family, reading a book or enjoying your hobbies.  Before we know it, we will be back to the hustle and bustle of life.

An ethical and professional duty

A shout-out is due to three medical students at IU School of Medicine – Northwest – Gary. Anna Fenner, Alexandra Trevino, and Courtney Raab have mobilized to gather donations of PPE and deliver them to frontline health workers at Community Hospital in Munster and Methodist Hospitals Northlake Campus in Gary.

Raab (pictured at far right) recently visited with nurses working in the COVID unit at Community Hospital who were grateful for the face shields they received.

Raab and Trevino started the initiative, and within a few weeks, they welcomed the efforts of Fenner, who stepped up to help with the deliveries.

“We teamed up with a very generous man from Portage who is making the shields with a 3D printer and donating them to our PPE effort,” Raab said. “We got 150 face shields this round, and donated 75 to Community and 75 to Methodist Northlake, two of the hardest hit hospitals. Additionally, through our PPE efforts, we have received 2,000 aluminum nose pieces to donate to people making cloth masks, as well as a few other smaller donations of masks, gloves, and more.”

Trevino was moved by the response from the staffs at both hospitals, who were incredibly grateful.

“I believe it is our ethical and professional responsibility as future health care providers to do whatever we can to take care of our own,” she said. “Any donation, no matter how small, can make a difference.”