COVID-19 Updates for Physicians & Providers

Support during COVID-19

We continue to update guidance regarding COVID-19 and the COVID-19 vaccine. Check back often for updated information below.

If you have a specific question related to COVID-19, visit our FAQ page where you can find answers to provider questions categorized by topic.

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COVID-19 testing

WALK-IN TESTING AVAILABLE

Effective Monday, June 28, Children’s Mercy is no longer offering drive-up COVID-19 testing at Children’s Mercy Broadway and our Urgent Care centers located at Children’s Mercy Northland, East and Blue Valley.

We will continue to offer perioperative drive-up COVID-19 testing for patients prior to their surgery or procedure. Asymptomatic patients who are fully vaccinated and not immunosuppressed no longer require pre-procedural testing. Fully vaccinated is defined as two weeks following the last recommended dose by manufacturer. Vaccine validation with visualization and documentation is required.

Urgent Care and Children's Mercy Broadway will offer walk-in testing for patients who need a COVID-19 test, no appointment or order needed. Please see walk-in testing hours by location below or click here for more information about COVID-19 testing.

Along with this change, there will no longer be a Patient Testing Hotline or web form to schedule a test (for both self- and provider-referral). Community providers can instead send patients for testing at one of the below locations and have them request a COVID-19 test.

If a patient is not already on the patient portal, they will receive a call from the Urgent Care Follow-Up NurseLine, (816) 960-3000. They can assist patients with a return to work or school note and a printed copy of the COVID-19 test results.

If a provider or medical group is listed as the primary care or referring provider in the patient's Children’s Mercy record, they will be able to receive the patient's COVID-19 test results in MyPatientConnections.

If you are not already registered for MyPatientConnections, instructions are below.

COVID-19 WALK-IN TESTING HOURS

Children's Mercy Broadway, first floor
3101 Broadway Blvd
Kansas City, MO 64111
Walk-in testing: 12:30 to 4:30 p.m. Monday-Friday

Children’s Mercy Blue Valley
6750 W. 135th St.
Overland Park, KS 66223
Walk-in testing during regular UCC hours: noon to 10 p.m. Monday-Friday and 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday-Sunday

Children's Mercy East
20300 E. Valley View Parkway
Independence, MO 64057
Walk-in testing during regular UCC hours: noon to 10 p.m. Monday-Friday and 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday-Sunday

Children's Mercy Northland
501 N.W. Barry Road
Kansas City, MO 64155
Walk-in testing during regular UCC hours: noon to 10 p.m. Monday-Friday and 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Saturday-Sunday

REGISTER FOR MYPATIENTCONNECTIONS

MyPatientConnections gives you access to view your Children's Mercy referrals; patient lab, pathology and diagnostic reports; inpatient progress notes; clinic notes; provider notes and discharge summaries. If your practice isn't already registered, we encourage you to register today.

Step 1: Visit MyPatientConnections.

Step 2: Click "To Register/Training Questions Click Here"

Step 3: Follow the prompts to either complete the Practice/Facility Setup Form or access Quick Reference Guides for more training.

For any additional needs or if you have questions, contact the MyPatientConnections team at mpc@cmh.edu.

QUESTIONS?

If you have a general question about COVID-19 that is not answered on our FAQ page, please email us at physicianservices@cmh.edu. We are working with our Infectious Diseases team to provide answers and will return your email within one business day.

Watch now: recording of the COVID-19 LIVE event - Vaccinating Your Pediatric Patients

A recording of the Friday, May 7 COVID-19 LIVE virtual event is now available!

Children's Mercy Infectious Diseases and Emergency Management physicians shared updates on the COVID-19 vaccine as it relates to our pediatric population, and provided information and guidance on how to offer the COVID-19 vaccine in your clinic. If you missed the COVID-19 LIVE virtual event, click the button below to watch a recording.

Watch event recording

COVID-19 vaccine curriculum available!

As you are starting to think about giving COVID-19 vaccines in your office, there is now a great opportunity to prepare. Children’s Mercy has teamed up with a group of children’s hospitals around the country to develop a COVID-19 vaccine curriculum for pediatricians and advanced practice providers as part of a national collaborative for pandemic preparedness for children.

The curriculum includes 3 educational modules:

Science behind COVID-19 vaccines
COVID-19 vaccine simulations
COVID-19 vaccine planning in the office setting

The modules are short (<1 hour) and can be completed at your own pace.

This initial rollout of the curriculum is being studied to learn about pediatricians’ COVID-19 vaccine knowledge, confidence to recommend COVID-19 vaccine, and plans to administer COVID-19 vaccines in the practice setting. By participating, you’ll be part of the study and will be asked to do some short pre- and post-surveys which each take about 15 minutes to complete.

On completion of the modules, you can receive ABP MOC part 2 credit.

If you are a physician or advanced practice provider and haven't received the email inviting you to participate, please complete this form to request access.

Physician CME Available for COVID-19 Vaccine Curriculum

Children’s Mercy Hospital is accredited by the Missouri State Medical Association to provide continuing medical education for physicians.

Children’s Mercy Hospital designates this enduring educational activity for a maximum of 1.0 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit(s)™. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

Successful completion of this CME activity, which includes participation in the evaluation component, enables the learner to earn up to 1.0 MOC points in the American Board of Pediatrics’ (ABP) Maintenance of Certification (MOC) program. It is the CME activity provider’s responsibility to submit learner completion information to ACCME for the purpose of granting ABP MOC credit.

FAQ & resources for physicians and providers

Access answers to provider questions, categorized by topic and updated on an ongoing basis. Questions received during COVID-19 LIVE events and otherwise are published here.

Additionally, locate resources including webinars, podcasts, published articles and more.

COVID-19 FAQ and resources

Recent topics from The Link newsletter

mRNA Vaccines vs. Variants, but the Variants’ Names “are all Greek to me”

Author: Christopher Harrison, MD | Professor of Pediatrics, UMKC School of Medicine | Clinical Professor of Pediatrics, University of Kansas School of Medicine

The good pandemic news is that U.S. new cases, hospitalizations and deaths have declined to Spring 2020 levels, seemingly due to ~55% of U.S. adults being fully immunized with an mRNA vaccine (Pfizer or Moderna) and increasing mRNA vaccination (Pfizer) of adolescents. Adding 55% for vaccine-induced immunity to the, at least partial, immunity in the 10-15% who recovered from SARS-CoV-2 infection, we are near the 70% needed for “herd immunity.” So, the U.S. is opening up and news should remain good unless one or more variant (e.g., UK B.1.1.7, Brazilian P.1/P.2, South African B.1.351 or India B.1.617.2 virus) becomes more prevalent and starts escaping either vaccine-induced (not very likely given current data) or infection-induced immunity (possible in light of real-world outbreaks internationally).

Variants are the elephant in the room because they have wreaked havoc among populations that had been estimated to have or be close to having infection-induced herd immunity, mostly mild or asymptomatic infections with the original Wuhan virus. But we are seeing that new variants can infect patients who recovered from original SARS-CoV-2 virus infections, and these breakthroughs can be severe – particularly if the original infection produced no or mild symptoms (e.g., India and Brazil). Interestingly, hospitalized but recovered patients appear to be protected against severe variant disease.

Now two U.S. variants (the New York B.1.526 virus and the California B.1.429 virus) are emerging. These also raise worries that we might not be as protected by vaccine or prior infections because they also have occurred in populations that had high rates of original Wuhan virus infection (California and New York).