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GRAND RAPIDS, MI – Spectrum Health hospitals are expected to reach capacity within days as the number of coronavirus hospitalizations continues to rise at an alarming rate, the chief executive officer of the Health Care System said on Wednesday. western Michigan.
“We face some of the most daunting and demanding challenges since the start of this pandemic,” Tina Freese Decker told reporters at an online press conference. “COVID-19 is on the rise in our state and we are heading in the wrong direction.”
She said the hospital was working to create more space for the outbreak of coronavirus patients, including expanding its intensive care units, postponing hospital surgeries requiring overnight stays and maximizing virtual health services. and at the edge of the street.
But even with those measures in place, Freese Decker warned the situation was dire.
“The reality is that Spectrum Health and our hospitals across the state will reach capacity in a matter of days, so we need to change this trajectory of community spread,” she said. “That’s why we need the help and support of our community. We need to flatten that curve like we did last spring.
As of Wednesday afternoon, 289 people were hospitalized for COVID-19 in Spectrum’s network of 14 hospitals in the region. Hospitalizations for the deadly infectious respiratory disease have tripled in the past 20 days and are eight times higher than in September, Freese Decker said. Hospitalizations are also more than three times higher than in the spring, when the pandemic began.
A question about Spectrum’s capacity for more coronavirus patients was not answered by Freese Decker and other hospital officials attending the press conference. But, later in the event, providing more context on what it would mean for Spectrum to reach capacity, she said Spectrum is working “to make sure we have this room” to treat more patients.
“We’re very creative and innovative in finding these ways to make sure we’re taking care of the people here before we have to expand outside,” Freese Decker said, in an apparent reference to alternative care sites that have been established in places such as convention centers and universities.
She added that capacity is determined not only by the beds open, but also by the staff available and the average length of stay in the hospital for each patient.
In addition to hospitalizations, the death rate among people hospitalized with COVID-19 is now “around one in 10,” Freese Decker said. And the number of people testing positive for the virus has also risen sharply.
Today, the COVID-19 positivity rate is around 14%, Freese Decker said. That’s an increase of 10% two weeks ago and less than 3% two months ago. Spectrum administers around 4,000 coronavirus tests per day.
“Be aware of what you are doing,” Freese Decker told reporters, when asked what steps residents can take to protect themselves and reduce the spread of the virus in the community. “We ask you to always wear a mask, to wash your hands, to be socially distanced.”
The number of infections has risen sharply across the state in the past month.
The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services reported 6,008 new cases and 42 deaths on Wednesday.
The state’s seven-day average is now 5,313 new cases per day, up from an average of 3,507 last Tuesday. The seven-day average of deaths is now 50 deaths per day, up from 19 a week ago today.
“We know our colleagues in other hospitals and healthcare facilities are experiencing the same exponential trend that we are experiencing,” said Freese Decker. The statewide outbreak is different from how the pandemic unfolded last spring, when “there were places we could go across the state or country for staffing. and the availability of services to people.
Rising coronavirus cases and hospitalizations are changing Spectrum’s operating procedures.
Starting tomorrow, Spectrum will begin restricting visitors for adult patients, except those who are in the intensive care unit or receiving end-of-life care, said Dr Darryl Elmouchi, president of Spectrum Health West Michigan.
He said the visitor restrictions are designed to protect patients, visitors and staff.
In addition, Spectrum will now only offer coronavirus testing for residents with symptoms of COVID-19. Residents who have been exposed to someone with COVID-19 but who are not showing symptoms will not be offered a test, Elmouchi said.
“The reasoning for this is # 1 – we want to make sure these symptomatic patients are tested, and # 2 – we want to make sure our test turnaround times are kept short so that these tests are truly actionable.” , did he declare.
When asked if Spectrum plans to open an alternative care site in the community, Elmouchi said hospital officials were “in active discussions with local and national authorities about the possibility of different care sites. alternative.
However, he added: “What we have learned from other places that have seen really big pushes like Detroit and New York is that these are used very rarely. You have to try to use first. your internal capacity and maximize its efficiency. “
Spectrum has partnered with Grand Valley State University to open a 100-bed alternative care site at the university’s Cook-DeVos Center for Health Sciences. In the end, the installation was not used because the space was not needed.
“The biggest limitation for this, to be quite honest, across the country and certainly here would be the staffing,” Elmouchi said, describing the challenges of creating an alternative care site. “Even if we had another site with hundreds of beds available, staffing will definitely be an issue if we come to this.
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