“Highland’s hospitalists have been true champions throughout each phase of the COVID-19 pandemic,” said Youngrin Kim, M.D., Chief Hospitalist. Early in the pandemic when we were all still learning how to manage COVID, there was no vaccine, and the mortality rate was higher, hospitalists stepped up along with the nursing staff to put themselves at personal risk to care for Highland’s COVID patients. Keely Dwyer-Matzky, M.D., Director of Patient Flow and her team transformed Highland’s Observation Unit into a COVID care unit, and COVID patients not in the ICU were cared for on one unit with a limited number of providers designated to care for them each week to prevent cross floor contamination and promote safety.