FAQs
For Healthcare Workers
What is MD COVIDsitters?
MD COVIDsitters is a voluntary initiative, organized by medical students and other volunteers. Our mission is to support local healthcare workers and other essential workers with urgent household needs during the coronavirus pandemic. We take care of your family’s needs, so that you can give your full focus to the COVID-19 response.
MD COVIDsitters is not affiliated with or officially endorsed by any academic institution.
Who can request help?
Any healthcare worker or essential worker, including but not limited to physicians, nurses, hospital cleaning crews, administrative staff, lab technicians, cafeteria workers, paramedics, grocery store workers, fire fighters, police officers, and food industry workers.
What services do MD COVIDsitters provide?
Our caregivers can provide childcare services (babysitting and/or tutoring for children of all ages), pet-sitting, as well as assisting with grocery shopping, light housekeeping, errands, and more! If the help you are in need of is not listed, please specify what you need on the application, and we will do our best to accommodate.
Because our students are not trained in childcare or managing disabilities, for safety reasons we are unable to provide services for children or adults with complex developmental needs. If you would like to clarify if your child fits into this category, please do not hesitate to reach out to our coordinators at volunteercoordinator@mdcovidsitters.org.
How much does this cost?
These services are being offered free of charge for healthcare professionals and other essential workers in our community. Our students are aware that this is unpaid work. However, if you ask your students to buy groceries or other products, please reimburse them in full. We also accept donations to support our organizational operations.
Are MD COVIDsitters licensed childcare providers?
No, our caregivers are not licensed childcare providers. However, all of our caregivers are required to pass a background check. Majority of our caregivers are CPR-trained and ACLS/BLS/PALS certified as a result of their training as healthcare professional student.
What if a volunteer cancels last minute?
All caregivers are required to give a 24-hour notice if they must cancel so that one of our coordinators can find a replacement. In the event a caregiver cancels within 24 hours of a scheduled session, we do our best to fulfill their absence with another volunteer. Workers will have direct communication access with a coordinator to report no-shows or any other issues with our caregivers.
What areas are MD COVIDsitters servicing?
Our caregivers are based in Maryland, Washington D.C., and Northern Virginia with the majority in the state of Maryland. For safety and practical reasons, we will do our best to match caregivers with families located nearby (less than 15-20 minutes drive).
What is MD COVIDsitters doing to limit the spread of disease?
All caregivers are instructed to follow the most recent CDC guidelines and recommendations from the Maryland Department of Health including frequent hand-washing, limited face-touching, strict social distancing, and isolation practices during and outside of volunteering. Per recent CDC guidelines, we also recommend that volunteers wear cloth face coverings when entering crowded public spaces (e.g. supermarkets, pharmacies, etc.) where social distancing is difficult.
Each caregiver is only assigned to one family to limit cross-family exposures, and may only care for children from the same household (i.e. siblings, live-in relatives).
Each caregiver should document travel location, hours of service, and the people present at every volunteer shift. This will allow us to know who to contact in case of a possible exposure.
Caregivers are not allowed to volunteer if they:
Have travelled recently to known COVID-19 high-risk areas (China, most European countries, Iran, etc.)
Been in contact with someone who has tested positive for the virus
Have experienced fever, coughing, shortness of breath or other COVID-19-related symptoms in the last 2 weeks.
If you have any further questions regarding our policies for caregivers and families, please email info@mdcovidsitters.org.
Can I receive help if myself or someone in my family works directly with patients who test positive for COVID—19?
Per CDC guidelines, if you or someone in your family tests positive for COVID-19 or experiences fever, shortness of breath, or other COVID-19 symptoms, please go into voluntary self-isolation immediately and follow your employer’s public health precaution protocol.
Contact your caregiver as soon as possible to terminate all future shifts. Please also email volunteercoordinator@mdcovidsitters.org. We will remove you from our request pool, and if you remain symptom-free, we will be happy to include you back into our service after a minimum of 14 days!