Local leaders tour NMMC, show how they utilized federal funding for coronavirus

North Mississippi Medical Center received federal funding to help with coronavirus relief.

The money they received is being put to use.

"the federal cares act money to upgrade our network infrastructure."

North mississippi health services ceo shane spees says the hospital used thousands of dollars from the cares act funding on monitors allowing nurses to monitor coronavirus patients from outside of the patients room, limiting contact "you can see the heart beat, you can see the amount of oxygen the patients getting, you can see the amount of carbon dioxide a patient is getting whether they are breathing big breaths or small breaths and the ability to do this outside the room."

Spees said these machines help to keep the spread down within the hospital and ultimetly the community "the less exposure we can have between an infected individual and non-infected the better off we are."

Almost all nursing equipment to monitor pateints is outside of all rooms which nurses said also help to allow patients to rest better and all rooms on the floor have windows where nurses watch the patient from outside systems operations officer jeremy blanchard added, with coronavirus cases rising, the hospital is able to monitor what hospitals have open beds across north mississppi "so although we have those beds here, we've had to expand to different places and different ways and to other beds in our institution."

Reporting in tupelo erin wilson wtva 9 news two straight week