An Insightful Letter From CEO of Cleveland Clinic - His And Other Healthcare CEOs’ Requests To President Trump

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Published Date: Friday, March 13, 2020

As you may know, I am from Cleveland, Ohio. For that reason, I get kept abreast of Ohio developments both for the coronavirus, and for the weather (usually, weather in Cleveland travels to Beacon in about one day… it’s how I’m so good at predicting snow flurries or super rainy days).

Earlier this week, in my inbox, an email arrived from the CEO of the Cleveland Clinic, Tomislav Mihaljevic, M.D. The email had been sent to Cleveland Clinic board members, and was forwarded to me by a friend. In this time of “What do we do in a pandemic?” I found it comforting. The Cleveland Clinic granted A Little Beacon Blog permission to publish it for you to read too. Here it is:

March 11, 2020

Dear Board Members,

We will keep you updated on Cleveland Clinic’s preparations and response to COVID-19.

At Cleveland Clinic, our primary concern is to care for patients and protect our caregivers. We are ahead of other organizations in terms of our preparations. We have collaborated with community leaders and providers to ensure the safest care for all patients.

Today (March 11, 2020), I am traveling to the White House and will be joined by other healthcare CEOs and top industry representatives. Our charge is to share what we are doing and also advise the federal government on what more can be done.

As a global healthcare leader, Cleveland Clinic is using this opportunity to request three barriers be removed by the government.

  • We believe access to care is critical and will ask for testing, treatment and quarantine to be guaranteed for all Americans through appropriate payment channels.

  • We seek relief from regulations that limit our ability to reach patients virtually and surveys that distract hospital operations during this epidemic.

  • And we request that all medical conferences and large gatherings be temporarily cancelled.

This morning, we announced the following precautions to our caregivers:

  • We are restricting all international and business travel until further notice.

  • We will be reviewing all Cleveland Clinic events, including Continuing Medical Education, for cancellation.

  • We asked caregivers to replace in-person meetings with virtual options.

  • Also, caregivers will not receive attendance infractions for shifts missed due to exposure to COVID-19, and we are finalizing guidelines to provide compensation during a leave of absence.
    In addition, we educated caregivers on how we are preparing in this video.

Because of our outstanding clinicians, I am proud to report that Cleveland Clinic will be the first to launch onsite patient testing for COVID-19, starting tomorrow, March 12. By testing onsite, we can return results within 8 hours, versus 3-4 days currently when sending to the CDC. We will begin with limited testing capacity and are working to quickly increase this in the days ahead.

We know you may get more questions about testing and will send these guidelines out to you shortly. We will continue to send frequent updates as this situation evolves. You can also visit ClevelandClinic.org or the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) website for information and travel guidance for more information about COVID-19.

Thank you for your support.
Tomislav Mihaljevic, M.D.
Chief Executive Officer and President
Cleveland Clinic