Intermountain Healthcare Overestimates Critical Care Capacity Issues, Utah Lawmaker Says

“They kicked out their nurses. They made hell for their employees, ”said rep Paul Ray

A Republican lawmaker in Utah has wrongly claimed that the shortage of intensive care beds in Utah hospitals is not due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but in part to poor business decisions.

Rep. Paul Ray, R-Clearfield made the comment during a hearing on what lawmakers could do to thwart President Joe Biden’s vaccine mandate for business. Ray wondered if people should be forced to get vaccinated.

“It’s a person’s choice. If you choose not to get the vaccine, you get sick and die. It’s yours. It’s your call, ”Ray said.

Uninvited, Ray moved on to reports that intensive care beds in Utah were beyond capacity because unvaccinated people were being hospitalized due to the uncontrolled spread of the delta variant.

“IHC says they’re out of space. They have no shortage of space. They no longer have employees. They chased away their doctors. They chased away their nurses. They made hell for their employees, ”Ray said. “They found themselves caught in the middle of a pandemic trying to change their business model to increase their bottom line by a billion dollars so they could make more money. They got caught with their pants down. Now all of a sudden it’s our fault.

Dr Marc Harrison, president and CEO of Intermountain Healthcare, said last week that Utah’s largest healthcare system would start postponing some surgeries as the increase in COVID cases pushed the capacity of intensive care in Intermountain hospitals above 100%.

Ray, who sponsored the ‘pandemic endgame’ bill earlier this year that lifted most COVID-related restrictions, said it was spurious to attribute the lack of capacity entirely to the COVID pandemic and to those who were not vaccinated.

“The children’s primary school, they said, was at 103% of capacity in their pediatric intensive care unit. They had two COVID patients, the others were trauma and RSV. Let’s be honest here. Let’s stop sowing fear. Let’s stop trying to push people and just let them make their own decisions for once and get the government out of it, ”Ray said.

Jess Gomez, spokesperson for Intermountain Healthcare, disputed Ray’s request.

“This characterization is not exact. All healthcare systems in Utah and the country have been deeply affected by the COVID pandemic and the continuing wave of new cases and hospitalizations caused by community transmission of the delta variant. Intermountain Healthcare also continues to experience very high patient volumes for COVID and non-COVID patient care. Our caregivers and leaders are working extremely hard to provide the best possible care during this extraordinary time, ”Gomez said in an email to The Tribune.

Utah health officials said Tuesday that about 1,900 other Utahns have tested positive for COVID-19 in the past 24 hours and 11 more have died from the coronavirus. School-aged children contracted about one in four of all new cases.

In a phone conversation with The Tribune on Wednesday afternoon, Ray clarified that his first comment on the understaffing referred to the lack of regular hospital beds, not just intensive care.

“Let’s be more frank with people. They don’t have the staff to take care of patients in regular beds. I feel like the intensive care units are full, but they can’t just blame COVID, ”Ray said.

In the early stages of the pandemic, Intermountain threatened to cut spending due to declining income from COVID-19, preventing many elective or elective surgeries and reducing inpatient admissions. Revenue fell nearly $ 435 million from March to May 2020. As a result, IHC ended up reducing 401 (k) matching contributions for employees.

“I’m going to officially say that the IHC is the best medical system I’ve seen in a lot of places. But, some of their capacity issues are the result of administrative choices they’ve made, ”said Ray.