McHENRY COUNTY – In light of the Johnson & Johnson (Janssen) COVID-19 vaccine having been paused due to rare, but potentially lethal side-effects, the McHenry County Department of Health (MCDH), like other vaccination providers, has had to work hard to replace J&J vaccination clinics with either Moderna or Pfizer vaccines.
At the time, MCDH public health administrator Melissa Adamson stated that the health department was apologetic for the inconvenience, but was appreciative of everyone’s patience and cooperation.
Despite some minor setbacks, McHenry County residents have shown their support to MCDH staff and volunteers for all the effort that has been put into the ongoing clinics in the area.
The McHenry County Board of Health held a meeting on April 19, where gratitude was not only expressed for those working at vaccination clinics, but for MCDH’s public nursing director Susan Karras.
At the meeting, Suzanne Blohm, the certified school nurse for Cary School District 26, came forward alongside Cary-Grove High School nurse Martha Manno, to thank Karras on behalf of the McHenry County School Nurse Task Force.
“We’re the co-chairs of the task force and if you haven’t heard of the task force, it is the brain child of Susan Karras. It would not be in existence without her and we just wanted to publicly bring it to your attention and recognize her for all her efforts. Over the summer or once the pandemic started, she was able to bring together 13 different nurses from nine different school districts,” Blohm told the Board of Health. “As well as the appropriate McHenry County staff to facilitate the implementation of the COVID-19 mitigation strategies. Specifically for the school sites. The culmination of that group was the publication of the School Nurse Task Force on the McHenry County Department of Health website and it’s really what has allowed McHenry County schools to open, open safely and stay open through all of this.”
Due to the positive experience expressed by nurses involved in the task force, Blohm stated that the group had decided that they would like to continue to operate as an independent group in order to provide further collaborative opportunities for nurses. Additionally, nurses in the task force would continue to serve as a resource to the community.
“Two of the big accomplishments that we’ve been able to achieve since that time is the McHenry County school staff vaccine clinics. Which again, Susan gave us all of the tools so that we could get a group together and vaccinate over 5,600 school staff members, two doses,” Blohm said. “Most recently, we were so proud of this collaboration that we wrote an article and submitted it for publication, and it’s been accepted for publication in the National School Nursing [Journal].” Further along in the meeting, board members were able to see thank you emails sent by McHenry County residents expressing their gratitude for the job well done at the various vaccination clinics hosted by MCDH.
One such email from McHenry County resident Judith “AJ” Ogorek, detailed her positive experience her and her husband had at McHenry County’s mass vaccination site that was formally a K-Mart located at 1900 N. Richmond Ave. in McHenry. “We did not have a long wait. Things were organized. Upon my query, the Doc “W” that injected me told me that he had [vaccinated] 70 folks that afternoon and he still laughed at my inane attempts of humor. The music was a nice touch. I danced my way through the process. Some of the volunteers and ‘injectees’ joined in. Socially distanced, of course,” Ogorek stated in her email to MCDH.
She went further to explain that while she waited in the observation area after having been vaccinated, she had run into a family member that she had not seen in quite some time. Ogorek recalled how appreciative she was of volunteers who checked in on her to make sure she was doing well.
Ogorek’s email was only one of many presented to the Board of Health that night, and while the struggle to get as many residents vaccinated against COVID-19 continues, MCDH can surely find comfort knowing residents appreciate the effort and transparency that has been put forward.
