The COVID-19 testing site at Butler Memorial Hospital had, at one point, been testing about 400 people throughout every eight-hour day. When the vaccines became available, the hospital staff was administering about that many doses a day.

Recently, the testing site has been seeing about 25 to 40 people over the course of a four-hour period, and the vaccine clinic has had about 20 people every Friday, its one day of operation per week.

Karen Allen, chief nursing officer at Butler Health System, said the hospital staff has gotten used to seeing peaks and valleys in COVID-19 trends over the past two years, but she is optimistic about the current falling trend in hospitalizations due to the disease.

“It has been kind of these waves of spikes and valleys,” Allen said. “The positivity rate is really low. We used to have pages and pages of positive tests and now we might have four out of the 20 that are positives.

“I think everyone is breathing a little easier.“

According to Allen, Butler Health System has a committee that discusses the COVID-19 trends that once met every day, but now meets once a week.

She said the committee has adjusted the hours of the COVID-19 testing site and the vaccine clinic based on the community trends. The recent trend of a low infection rate has the committee mulling the option of phasing out the vaccine clinic since free vaccines are available elsewhere.

“We are considering shutting that down in the future because vaccines are available in many locations,” Allen said. “We are waiting to see if a fourth booster is recommended, and then we would have to expand our hours.”

Additionally, administrators are monitoring national and international trends in COVID-19 transmission. Allen said the omicron variant was the most recent mutation of the original COVID-19 virus to increase transmission, and that variant has also developed a variant. However, she said the local vaccination rate may keep new variants at bay.

The downward trend on COVID-19 cases also has the hospital administration looking at bringing back the gift shop, which has been closed since March 2020. Allen said the hospital auxiliary committee runs the gift shop, and they may be back in Butler Memorial soon.

Allen said the best aspect of the hospital that never really left, but had been diminished during the heights of the pandemic, is the patient care delivered by the nurses. With only eight COVID-19 patients in the hospital and one in the intensive care unit as of Wednesday morning, Allen said the top-notch care now is easier for nurses to deliver.

“Our nurses have stepped up to the plate and worked some extra hours throughout the pandemic,“ Allen said. ”Now we can focus on what we love, which is providing patient care and great experiences.“