Effective immediately and until further notice, Illinois Valley Community
Hospital is restricting access to its main building at 925 West Street
in Peru. This is one of several measures being taken by IVCH to protect
patients and staff from possible exposure to the coronavirus.
Patients who need to come to IVCH for required tests are asked to enter
the hospital through entrance A at the southeast corner of the building
adjacent to the main parking lot.
Patients needing emergency care should come to the main entrance off 6th Street on the north side of the building, next to the emergency department entrance.
All other entrances—including the hospital’s West Street entrance—will
be locked. An exterior map of the hospital campus showing entrance locations
can be found at
www.ivch.org.
In an effort to limit unnecessary personal contact, IVCH is also allowing
only one other person to enter the hospital with a patient and that person
must be age 18 or older.
Obstetrics patients may have only one person with them for their entire
stay and the one person accompanying a pediatric patient (anyone below
the age of 18) must be the patient’s parent or legal guardian.
IVCH has also:
- Eliminated patient visiting hours—no visitors are allowed until further notice.
- Halted valet parking services indefinitely.
- Suspended all services provided by volunteers, including the “Red
Coat” volunteer escorts.
- Closed the hospital gift shop.
“We are asking for the public’s help in keeping our patients
and staff safe,” said Tommy Hobbs, IVCH chief executive officer.
Hobbs said the IVCH emergency room remains open 24 hours a day to treat
serious illnesses and injuries. He said patients with respiratory illness
symptoms should call their doctor first or go to a walk-in clinic.