UMass Medical School students to aid Worcester vaccination effort

Photo | Grant Welker UMass Chan Medical School in Worcester

Write a Comment

By Grant Welker

More than 150 UMass Medical School students are being trained to help quickly administer COVID-19 vaccinations in Worcester.

The students are part of an effort the Worcester school detailed on Wednesday to provide the highly anticipated shots to first responders, including firefighters and police officers, as well as residential care facility residents. Chancellor Michael Collins and UMass President Marty Meehan have also advocated for similar widespread vaccination efforts statewide.

More than 30,000 vaccinations have been shipped to health facilities in Worcester County as of Dec. 31, according to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, enough to cover 3.6% of the county's population. That's a share of more than 285,000 doses shipped statewide. More than 78,000 shots have been administered, according to the DPH, including what Worcester city officials have said are thousands at UMass Memorial Health Care and Saint Vincent Hospital.

Graduate nursing students at UMass Medical School are training more than 150 students in the School of Medicine to administer vaccinations in coordination with the Worcester Division of Public Health, which is overseeing vaccinations of first responders in the city and adjacent towns.

Other UMass Medical School students are taking part in a separate initiative aiming to lessen the emotional impact the pandemic has had on older people who've suffered from the virus.

A year-long grant from the school's Remillard Family Community Service Fund has allowed 85 students in UMass' School of Medicine and Graduate School of Nursing to check in through secure video calls on hospitalized coronavirus patients 65 and older and to lend emotional support. Patients generally aren't allowed to have visitors in order to minimize the spread of the virus.

Dr. Adarsha Bajracharya, an assistant professor of medicine at UMass Medical School and the creator and co-leader of the program, said hospital volunteers provide an invaluable service that is beneficial for patients as well as the clinical team.

“We have recognized the anxiety in older adult patients as COVID-19 places them in quarantine,” Bajracharya said in a statement. “They are surrounded by a lot of unknowns while being alone, and the doctors and nurses are centered on the patient’s medical status. In a time like this, patients need someone to talk to and divert their thoughts from the clinical heaviness. Patients look forward to having this kind of conversation daily so they can have a lightened stay at the hospital.”