Hospitals across the US are treating patients in conference rooms and tents erected in parking lots as a virus trifecta overwhelms the wards.
Official data shows that hospitals across the country are busier than ever during the pandemic. with nearly 80 percent of beds in use.
It’s not just Covid doctors are grappling anymore, though, as a post-lockdown surge in flu and RSV is causing drug and bed shortages.
US hospitals have been treating patients in tents since mid-November after being hit with a particularly sharp rise in flu and covid, especially since Thanksgiving.
But units in Albuquerque, San Diego and San Francisco have also had to set up makeshift rooms to deal with the ‘triple epidemic’ of viruses.
UC San Diego Health has been testing patients in tents like the one above in parking lots due to a lack of space for beds in their regular wards.
Doctors will sort patients into tents, assessing their needs before they can enter. An equal increase in the number of Covid, flu and RSV patients has overwhelmed the hospital
The Hospital of the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque was forced to set up inflatable tents due to the number of patients that far exceeded what it had treated at any time during the pandemic.
Children have been hit particularly hard, with three-quarters of children’s hospital beds already full across the country, blamed on lowered natural immunity caused by the lockdown.
Minors are already at higher risk of RSV and flu, but after crucial exposure to healthy germs was robbed of them after two years of masks, lockdowns and school closures.
Tents have been set up in front of UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital in San Francisco after the 10,000-bed hospital filled to capacity last month.
Still accepting patients, he set up a tent called a ‘flex space’ with room for seven beds.
Dr. Joan Zoltansky, medical director of UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital, said KABC-TV: ‘In that tent, there is a space for patients with conditions of less acuity, sprain or ankle sprain or simple ear pain.’
UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital in Oakland also created an annex space to treat patients when their emergency rooms are full.
A man has blood drawn in an overflowing tent outside Scripps Memorial Hospital Encinitas on November 11. The California hospital was forced to put up the tent after a spike in flu patients.
The exterior of the UC San Diego Health tent, in an area that would normally be occupied by parked cars. Beds were also set up in the corridors inside the hospital for patients who have been admitted but were waiting for a bed.
Dr. Zoltansky said: ‘We have space in Oakland. It is equivalent to a tent, it does not happen to be a tent. It’s what we call an annex space in Oakland where we often see patients when our ERs are full of patients.
Meanwhile, UC San Diego Health has been testing patients in tarp tents in parking lots due to a lack of space.
Beds were also set up in the corridors for admitted patients waiting for a hospital bed.
It comes as patients at multiple hospitals have been forced to stand for hours in emergency room waiting rooms.
The hospital’s medical director, Dr. Christopher Longhurst, said CNN that the staff was even reconfiguring the conference room space to serve the patients there.
The hospital has been overwhelmed with as many Covid patients as flu and RSV patients.
An Albuquerque hospital also closed off its parking lot to set up inflatable tents outside its emergency department.
The University of New Mexico Hospital had to put up the tents because the number of patients far exceeded what it had seen at any time during the pandemic.
For now, the tents are being used to test patients, where doctors will make their initial assessments of what is wrong.
There are no extensive operations or treatments taking place because the stores only have basic equipment.
Dr. Steve McLaughlin, medical director of UNM Hospital, said KOAT-TV: ‘This was in response to the high levels of those respiratory infections that we are seeing in the hospital.
“Because of the impact on space in the emergency department, we opened up this tent, which allows us a little bit of extra space, some flexibility.”
Doctors have said this year’s season is “worse than any” they’ve faced, as seasonal bugs return in force and flu and RSV cases hit their highest level in more than a decade.
There is also growing concern that the US is about to be hit with a wave of strep A infections after 15 children in the UK died from the normally benign bacteria, which is more common after infections. viruses like RSV and the flu.
Idaho, Arizona and Rhode Island are the most affected states in the United States. Meanwhile, some are already telling people to mask up again, and not because of covid.
Official data showed that children’s hospitals in Idaho are completely overwhelmed, treating more children than they have beds, with 160 percent occupancy.
UC San Diego Health relies on tents to triage patients. At other California hospitals, health care staff were even reconfiguring conference room space to care for patients there.
The hospital has had to close its parking lot to make room for triage. Dr. Steve McLaughlin, the hospital’s medical director, said the change had to be made because of high levels of respiratory infections.
Arizona had the second-busiest boys’ ward overall, with 825 of 850 beds, or 97 percent, filled.
Rhode Island followed with 223 of 232 beds occupied (96 percent), Nevada with 319 of 339 beds (94 percent) and Utah with 421 of 451 beds (93.3 percent).
Idaho has only one children’s hospital, St Luke’s, which is based in the state capital, Boise.
In late November, Dr. Kathryn Turner, Idaho’s deputy state epidemiologist, warned that her wards were at “really low” capacity.
“What we’re seeing right now is we’re seeing a normal increase in covid cases, an increase in influenza cases — an early flu season, an early RSV season, and it’s all happening at the same time.” said. KTVB7.
“It’s happening at a time when our health care system is at really low capacity, not just because of these viral illnesses, but because they have staffing constraints.”
Doctors have been warning that this year’s flu season is one of the worst yet for children’s hospitals.
Dr. Surabhi Bhargava Vora, an infectious disease expert at Seattle Children’s Hospital, told the New York Times last month: ‘[This season] it’s worse than any RSV season I’ve seen.’
