With all-time admissions to COVID-19 hospitals, hospitals in Orange County were instructed Thursday to cancel alternative surgery in response to an “emergency” situation and implement additional plans that could “collapse” the emergency medical system.
Alternative surgeries may include serious procedures, such as stent placement or heart valve replacement. This phrase refers to any surgery that is scheduled ahead of time.
The number of hospitalized patients in Orange County rose from 974 on Wednesday to 1,025 on Thursday, a new record that includes 257 intensive care units, up from 239 on Wednesday, also a new record. The previous peak was 245 in mid-July.
The Orange County Health Care Agency on Thursday registered 1,521 new coronavirus diagnoses, an increase of 94,647. The county’s test positivity rate has risen from 8.8% to 10.6%.
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The agency also reported seven new casualties, with the death toll rising to 1,640. One of the dead was a resident of a skilled nursing facility.
Late Wednesday night, HCAA sent a letter to hospitals, ambulance providers and 911 paramedic providers stating that the county’s health care system was “now in crisis” due to the increase in cowardly patients, urging more hospitals to divert ambulances to other medical centers. Due to the proportion of the patient.
According to the letter, “This leads to dangerous delays in early patient assessment to ensure that they do not have an emergency medical condition. Hospitals are overflowing with patients admitted to both floors and ICUs. At the current deterioration rate, the EMS system fell until emergency directives were applied. Can. “
HCA’s EMS Medical Director Dr. Carl Schultz’s letter urges hospitals to activate surgery plans, establish alternative treatment areas in emergency departments, increase capacity, cancel all alternative surgeries, apply for a state waiver in support of surgery plans, and set up emergency operations centers.
“For those who have chosen not to take this painful but necessary action, there is still time, but you must act now,” Schultz wrote.
Orange County Supervisor Lisa Bartlett said the county could now see a surge in Thanksgiving cases.
“This is basically the Hale Mary Pass,” said Andrew Numer, UC Irwin associate professor of population health and disease prevention, about the county’s directive to hospitals. “It shows the gravity of the situation.”
This week’s figures are reflecting the Thanksgiving gathering, he confirmed.
The county’s percentage of available ICU beds rose from 11.2% to 11.3% on Thursday, but the rate jumped from 4.9% to 3.5%, according to the HCA, according to the new state metric for the availability of “adjusted” ICU beds.
Kim said a balanced ICU number essentially reflects the number of beds available for COVID-19 patients when factoring in the number of beds needed for patients without coronavirus.
The available ICU capacity of the 11-County Southern California area fell to 7.7% on Thursday from 9%.
More than 12,819 new cases were reported Thursday in Orange County’s more urban neighborhood in the north, breaking the record set Sunday.
Going home, Mayor Eric Garcetti left one more surprising statistic. “In Los Angeles, every 20 minutes someone is killing a Covid-19,” he said.
A total of 3,634 people infected with the virus were hospitalized in LA County on Thursday. That’s a 6% increase since Wednesday and a new high.
“It’s very likely that in two weeks we’ll see about 4,000 hospitalized patients every day,” Barbara Ferrer, LA County’s director of public health, said Tuesday. Overall the beds were running at about 75% full rate, Ferrer said, adding that some hospitals in the LA network are already out of ICU beds.
LA County Health and Human Services Director Dr. Christina Galli said Thursday that higher admissions rates mean there will be less shortage of available and staffed general beds and ICU beds, with plans to increase the number of county hospitals likely to increase.
She also noted that a two-hour ambulance divert was imposed on Tuesday due to an emergency ore condition in 77% of Los Angeles County hospitals. On a normal day at this time of year, usually only 10% to 15% of hospitals call for such a diversion.
The same day news came that California had the highest number of covid related deaths ever in the year 220. The highest number of coronavirus-related deaths in the country on Wednesday was over 1,000.
The City News Service contributed to this report.
