SARANAC LAKE — Three North Country hospitals have confirmed that as of Thursday, no staff members have been diagnosed with COVID-19.

Representatives of Adirondack Medical Center in Saranac Lake, Alice Hyde Medical Center in Malone and Elizabethtown Community Hospital say no employees have been diagnosed with the disease caused by the novel coronavirus.

In other parts of the state, where severe outbreaks have hospitalized hundreds of people and some hospitals are experiencing a shortage of personal protective equipment such as masks, some health care workers have been exposed to the virus while on the job and subsequently died from COVID-19.

Local hospitals are taking precautions to try to protect staff from exposure.

All employees at AMC, ECH and Alice Hyde are being screened at the door, as are the limited number of visitors authorized to enter. The hospitals encourage social distancing among staff and have encouraged employees who don’t need to physically be there to work from home. Elective surgeries have been canceled at all three hospitals, and many primary care appointments have either been postponed or moved to a virtual format.

“We have temporarily suspended our student and volunteer programs, and suspended the use of Alice Hyde facilities by community groups,” Alice Hyde spokesman Phillip Rau said. “We have temporarily suspended all non-medical visitation at the hospital and The Alice Center (our nursing home) … We have also developed a Surge Plan in the event of a large influx of patients, which include plans to cohort COVID-19 positive patients and non-COVID-19 patients in order to reduce the chance of exposure.”

Elizabeth Rogers, a spokeswoman for ECH, said the hospital is providing the most up-to-date guidance and training for PPE to its staff. The hospital is using isolated patient care areas in its emergency department to evaluate patients with respiratory symptoms or fever. Negative-pressure rooms have been set up for longer stays, and guidelines issued by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are being followed for disinfecting patient care areas.

All three hospitals currently have enough PPE for their staffs — for now.

ECH is accepting donations of N95 masks, Rogers said.

Additional PPE such as masks, gowns and gloves is needed at Alice Hyde, according to Rau.

“We monitor our supply by the number of days on hand that we could meet our current needs, and we continue to work with our vendors, and state and county officials to secure additional PPE,” Rau said.

Adirondack Health CEO Sylvia Getman said at a virtual panel discussion on coronavirus last week that AMC had enough PPE at the time, though the hospital’s needs would likely to change in the future.