LAUSR

The United States, with over 11 million cases and ∼250,000 deaths (1), has become the epicenter of the COVID-19 worldwide pandemic since the first case was identified in Washington State on January 19, 2020. In New York City the first case of community acquired COVID-19 was identified on March 1, 2020 and the number of known cases increased rapidly making the city the epicenter of COVID-19 in the United States. Public hospitals became deluged with patients as the communities they serve, urban poor and minority, were disproportionately affected by the disease. COVID-19 often affects the nervous system with both central and peripheral sequalae, neurology services had to adapt to a new landscape (2–6). This paper will report on the process changes for the neurology service, in particular for stroke and electroencephalography (EEG) services, at King County Hospital Center (KCHC), a 637 bed, public, university-affiliated, teaching hospital in central Brooklyn, New York, which serves a predominantly African American community. Implementing those changes resulted in maintaining our pre-COVID structure and quality of care despite the workflow, economic, and technical challenges induced by the virus.