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“Hospitalized patients diagnosed with the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus have been in the Vilnius Republic University Hospital since November, but so far we have treated patients whose main diagnosis was not COVID-19, but any trauma, surgical pathology or neurological. , but at the same time they were also infected with coronavirus.
And since last weekend, on behalf of the Santara clinics, we have become a hospital for people with a predominant diagnosis of COVID-19, and we have already received the first patients who need treatment for this disease, “said the director from the hospital, Dr. Jelena Kutkauskiene
According to the director of the institution, during the first and second waves, the priority objective was to ensure the provision of emergency care to the Vilnius Republican Hospital using other hospital treatment facilities in the region, such as the Vilnius City Clinical Hospital , Ukmergė Hospital, Švenčionys Hospital.
The fact that a strategically important body such as an ambulance hospital must join the main front of COVID-19 shows that the situation is really difficult and the public must react very seriously to this signal.
Photo by Vidmantas Balkūnas / 15 min photo / Vilnius University Hospital Building in Lazdynai
In the Republican Republican Hospital of Vilnius, three COVID-19 units have been formed, with 102 beds for patients with the disease, half of which have oxygen inputs, and another 16 beds have been enabled for COVID-19 patients in the Unit of Resuscitation and Intensive Care.
The biggest challenge is human resources
The increasing flow of patients with COVID-19 requires not only the physical infrastructure but also the human resources that serve it.
“Due to the more physically demanding working conditions and the longer breaks provided to employees, the need for staff to care for COVID-19 patients is one and a half times greater than in a regular unit,” says the Director of the institution.
We closely monitor so-called “cow” bed occupancy rates: we retrieve patients who can no longer infect those around them, attempt to move them to other wards immediately, and discharge asymptomatic or mild patients at home referring them to GPs for COVID-19 There would be no shortage of beds for new patients or staff to supervise them, ”said the director of RVUL Hospital.
According to the director of RVUL, dr. J. Kutkauskienė, the emergence of patients with a predominant diagnosis of COVID-19 in the hospital will inevitably bring new staff management challenges, which have not been lacking recently due to the large number of sick doctors.
Being an emergency surgical hospital by specialization, we have never had a great capacity to treat patients with a therapeutic profile.
“Being an emergency surgical hospital by specialization, we have never had much capacity to treat patients with a therapeutic profile.
We do not have an infectious disease department, and our Therapy Department staff have been working in the COVID-19 units since the fall, so when we receive new patients hospitalized specifically for COVID-19 disease, we look forward to receiving reinforcements from the institution. organizer, especially if they are referred. it will increase the volume of patients. “
It is coordinated with the direction of the Vilnius University Faculty of Medicine that residents of the COVID-19 wards of the Vilnius Republican University Hospital should be assisted by residents of the therapeutic profile.
Hope the hardest days for the hospital are already gone
After a general examination of the staff of the institution, after the identification of many asymptomatic cases among employees, the Vilnius Republican University Hospital in December. Planned operations were suspended and emergency relief flows were redistributed between the capital’s main hospitals.
“We have not yet experienced such a difficult time as in the run-up to Christmas,” admitted the hospital director, Dr. J.Kutkauskienė. – At the same time, up to 365 employees were rendered incapable of work due to the coronavirus infection, putting hospital operations at real risk of collapse. However, now that recovering staff are slowly returning, more and more volunteers are joining the COVID-19 team and we want to believe that we have already been through the blackest period of crisis. “
We have not yet experienced such a difficult time as before Christmas.
The director of the institution also has high hopes for the COVID-19 vaccine, which has already reached Lithuania. So far, only 245 doctors have been vaccinated at the Vilnius Republican University Hospital, but the scope of vaccination is expected to expand as soon as new batches of this vaccine arrive.
“I hope that the vaccine, the strict quarantine restrictions and other measures to manage the pandemic will finally have a complex effect. Although we will have to live with this coronavirus for a long time, it may not pose such a great threat to the health system and In the long run, it will be possible to return to normal operating conditions, which we all long for.
Currently, the work of the institution is being reorganized in such a way as to ensure all the emergency care provided according to the hospital profile, and in the near future it is also planned to resume some of the planned services: outpatient surgery and services of outpatient rehabilitation.
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