Feb. 21, 2005

Caution Urged as Flu Peaks
Officials encourage protective measures

Flu season is in full swing in northeast Wisconsin, prompting public health officals to encourage residents to take extra protective measures against the virus.

Jim Piper, manager of the emergency department and intensive care unit at Aurora Medical Center, said 20 percent of his staff has been hit with the flu.

"We are really asking people to take preventive measures to keep from infecting others," said Piper, encouraging people to frequently wash their hands if they come in contact with someone with the flu.

In an effort to contain the highly communicable virus from infecting critical health- care personnel at the peak of the flu season, the center is putting a mask on anyone who comes in with flu-like symptoms.

Typical symptoms include fever above 100 degrees and a sore throat or coughing. High fever is a common symptom for the onset of a host of diseases, which makes it difficult for health-care workers to gauge the actual impact of the virus.

While the flu season usually peaks at the end of January in Wisconsin, this year it came in February.

On Jan. 31, half of the 60 patients at Aurora Medical Center's walk-in clinic had symptoms of the flu. By the beginning of February, the number of flu patients increased to two-thirds. Throughout the state, the number of flu cases doubled to 185 on Feb. 5 from the previous week.

For the week of Feb. 12, Lars Swanson, a doctor with Affinity medical group, documented 214 cases of the type-A flu strain within the Affinity system. Public health officials expect the number of cases to continue to rise.

Since a predicted flu vaccine shortage did not materialize this season, health officials still are encouraging people to get vaccinations, saying it is not too late.

Originally published in The Northwestern.