Hey Shady, good job down there. It DIDN'T have to happen. But the rubes bought the politicization in the Orange Guy's pathetic Covid response and the junk science driven conspiracy theories about vaxxes and 'treatments'…..horse pills.
‘This didn’t have to happen’: Southern Illinois hospitals filling their ICUs, asking the state for help
By LISA SCHENCKER and JOE MAHR
CHICAGO TRIBUNE |
SEP 01, 2021 AT 6:33 PM
The latest surge in COVID-19 cases has hit many parts of the state hard, but perhaps no region has felt it more than southern Illinois, where hospitals say they’re filling their ICU beds, postponing surgeries and even turning away some patients.
In southern Illinois, just 7% of ICU beds were available as of Tuesday night, and the weekly average was even less: 6%. At one point last week, only one ICU bed was available across all 22 hospitals in southern Illinois — a region with more than 400,000 residents, according to the 2020 U.S. census.
Statewide, about 17% of ICU beds were available as of Tuesday night. The Illinois Department of Public Health considers it concerning if a region has fewer than 20% of its ICU beds available.
Southern Illinois Healthcare, which has two of the largest hospitals in the region, in Carbondale and Herrin, had filled its 29 ICU beds at those hospitals Wednesday, said Jennifer Harre, chief nursing officer.
In fact, the two hospitals had 30 ICU patients, meaning that some were receiving ICU care in other parts of the hospital, she said.
The system has reached out to the state for additional staffing, including nurses, nursing assistants and respiratory therapists, among others, and expects those extra hands to arrive next week, she said.
The system is also delaying some elective surgeries, when they’re not emergencies and can be postponed, she said. And it’s often keeping patients in beds in the emergency departments until beds become available elsewhere in the hospitals.
Hospital employees are pulling together and doing their best, but they’re also tired, said Rex Budde, president and CEO of Southern Illinois Healthcare.
All but three of the hospitals’ 22 COVID-19 ICU patients are unvaccinated, Harre said.
“They’re kind of frustrated when you have 19 people who are intubated who aren’t vaccinated,” Budde said at a news conference Wednesday. “This didn’t have to happen in many cases, and they have to deal with it and find the time to deal with other kinds of folks who need to be in the hospital.”
Southern Illinois Healthcare is not the only hospital system in the region that’s straining under the COVID-19 surge. Each day, Southern Illinois Healthcare is getting calls from other hospitals — near and far — asking if they can send patients to Southern Illinois Healthcare’s hospitals, Harre said.
“We are still trying to accept patients when we can, but we are having to turn a significant amount of patients away,” Harre said of calls from other hospitals.
A Tribune analysis of state data shows that southern Illinois’ rate of hospitalizations is nearly as high as it was at its peak last fall: a rate of nearly 41 per 100,000 residents, compared with a rate of 43 just after Thanksgiving.
Its hospitalization rate is by far the highest in Illinois, and more than triple the rate in the city of Chicago.
About 37% of southern Illinois residents are fully vaccinated, compared with nearly 54% in Chicago.
A Tribune analysis of state health department data shows that the pace of vaccinations in the southern region has tripled since early July. But the overall percentage of residents fully vaccinated still remains the lowest of Illinois’ 11 regions.
Across the region’s 22 hospitals, many are delaying elective surgeries and keeping patients in beds in their emergency departments while they wait for other beds to become available, said Arien Herrmann, regional hospital coordinating center manager for region five, which encompasses the southernmost part of Illinois. On Wednesday, 20 patients across those 22 hospitals were waiting in emergency departments for beds elsewhere in the hospitals, he said.
“It creates a backlog,” he said. “If that emergency department bed is full, now you’ve got a backlog of ambulances showing up at your ambulance bay trying to offload patients, but if there’s not an emergency department bed readily available, then you’re treating patients in the hallway.”
Like Southern Illinois Healthcare, other hospitals have also reached out to the state for additional staff, Herrmann said. At least 10 hospitals in the region have asked the state for more staff, he said, and many of those workers should arrive next week. In those arrangements, the state is getting additional staffing from agencies and then deploying the workers where needed, he said.
The state has already sent four nurses to Fairfield Memorial Hospital to help it deal with the surge of COVID-19 patients, and more are expected soon, said Debra Spillman, clinical practice coordinator at Fairfield.
Fairfield Memorial’s four ICU beds have often been full or close to full in recent weeks, she said.
It’s not unusual for the small hospital to fill all of its beds at different points in the year, said Hazel Vest, the hospital’s surgery director. But they don’t often stay full so consistently, she said.
Patients don’t seem be to dying of COVID-19 as often as they did during earlier surges, “but they are coming in a little bit sicker ... and staying longer for treatment,” Vest said.
About 32% of Wayne County, where Fairfield sits, is fully vaccinated, according to a Tribune analysis of data from the Illinois Department of Public Health and U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
In DuPage County, the percentage is nearly double that, at about 62% fully vaccinated.
Budde, the CEO at Southern Illinois Healthcare, said some people are firmly against the vaccines. Others are concerned about rare side effects.
“Practically speaking, the risk of death from the vaccine is virtually zero. There’s a very real risk of dying from the virus,” Budde said. “In my mind, this is akin to somebody watching a match burn and ignoring the fact that the forest is on fire around them.”
So far, about 10 of Southern Illinois Healthcare’s employees have said they plan to resign rather than get vaccinated, said Pam Henderson, vice president of human resources. Gov. J.B. Pritzker said last week that all health care workers in the state must now get vaccines, and Southern Illinois Healthcare had announced a vaccine mandate for its workers before that.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/coronavirus/ct...-story.htm
‘This didn’t have to happen’: Southern Illinois hospitals filling their ICUs, asking the state for help
By LISA SCHENCKER and JOE MAHR
CHICAGO TRIBUNE |
SEP 01, 2021 AT 6:33 PM
The latest surge in COVID-19 cases has hit many parts of the state hard, but perhaps no region has felt it more than southern Illinois, where hospitals say they’re filling their ICU beds, postponing surgeries and even turning away some patients.
In southern Illinois, just 7% of ICU beds were available as of Tuesday night, and the weekly average was even less: 6%. At one point last week, only one ICU bed was available across all 22 hospitals in southern Illinois — a region with more than 400,000 residents, according to the 2020 U.S. census.
Statewide, about 17% of ICU beds were available as of Tuesday night. The Illinois Department of Public Health considers it concerning if a region has fewer than 20% of its ICU beds available.
Southern Illinois Healthcare, which has two of the largest hospitals in the region, in Carbondale and Herrin, had filled its 29 ICU beds at those hospitals Wednesday, said Jennifer Harre, chief nursing officer.
In fact, the two hospitals had 30 ICU patients, meaning that some were receiving ICU care in other parts of the hospital, she said.
The system has reached out to the state for additional staffing, including nurses, nursing assistants and respiratory therapists, among others, and expects those extra hands to arrive next week, she said.
The system is also delaying some elective surgeries, when they’re not emergencies and can be postponed, she said. And it’s often keeping patients in beds in the emergency departments until beds become available elsewhere in the hospitals.
Hospital employees are pulling together and doing their best, but they’re also tired, said Rex Budde, president and CEO of Southern Illinois Healthcare.
All but three of the hospitals’ 22 COVID-19 ICU patients are unvaccinated, Harre said.
“They’re kind of frustrated when you have 19 people who are intubated who aren’t vaccinated,” Budde said at a news conference Wednesday. “This didn’t have to happen in many cases, and they have to deal with it and find the time to deal with other kinds of folks who need to be in the hospital.”
Southern Illinois Healthcare is not the only hospital system in the region that’s straining under the COVID-19 surge. Each day, Southern Illinois Healthcare is getting calls from other hospitals — near and far — asking if they can send patients to Southern Illinois Healthcare’s hospitals, Harre said.
“We are still trying to accept patients when we can, but we are having to turn a significant amount of patients away,” Harre said of calls from other hospitals.
A Tribune analysis of state data shows that southern Illinois’ rate of hospitalizations is nearly as high as it was at its peak last fall: a rate of nearly 41 per 100,000 residents, compared with a rate of 43 just after Thanksgiving.
Its hospitalization rate is by far the highest in Illinois, and more than triple the rate in the city of Chicago.
About 37% of southern Illinois residents are fully vaccinated, compared with nearly 54% in Chicago.
A Tribune analysis of state health department data shows that the pace of vaccinations in the southern region has tripled since early July. But the overall percentage of residents fully vaccinated still remains the lowest of Illinois’ 11 regions.
Across the region’s 22 hospitals, many are delaying elective surgeries and keeping patients in beds in their emergency departments while they wait for other beds to become available, said Arien Herrmann, regional hospital coordinating center manager for region five, which encompasses the southernmost part of Illinois. On Wednesday, 20 patients across those 22 hospitals were waiting in emergency departments for beds elsewhere in the hospitals, he said.
“It creates a backlog,” he said. “If that emergency department bed is full, now you’ve got a backlog of ambulances showing up at your ambulance bay trying to offload patients, but if there’s not an emergency department bed readily available, then you’re treating patients in the hallway.”
Like Southern Illinois Healthcare, other hospitals have also reached out to the state for additional staff, Herrmann said. At least 10 hospitals in the region have asked the state for more staff, he said, and many of those workers should arrive next week. In those arrangements, the state is getting additional staffing from agencies and then deploying the workers where needed, he said.
The state has already sent four nurses to Fairfield Memorial Hospital to help it deal with the surge of COVID-19 patients, and more are expected soon, said Debra Spillman, clinical practice coordinator at Fairfield.
Fairfield Memorial’s four ICU beds have often been full or close to full in recent weeks, she said.
It’s not unusual for the small hospital to fill all of its beds at different points in the year, said Hazel Vest, the hospital’s surgery director. But they don’t often stay full so consistently, she said.
Patients don’t seem be to dying of COVID-19 as often as they did during earlier surges, “but they are coming in a little bit sicker ... and staying longer for treatment,” Vest said.
About 32% of Wayne County, where Fairfield sits, is fully vaccinated, according to a Tribune analysis of data from the Illinois Department of Public Health and U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
In DuPage County, the percentage is nearly double that, at about 62% fully vaccinated.
Budde, the CEO at Southern Illinois Healthcare, said some people are firmly against the vaccines. Others are concerned about rare side effects.
“Practically speaking, the risk of death from the vaccine is virtually zero. There’s a very real risk of dying from the virus,” Budde said. “In my mind, this is akin to somebody watching a match burn and ignoring the fact that the forest is on fire around them.”
So far, about 10 of Southern Illinois Healthcare’s employees have said they plan to resign rather than get vaccinated, said Pam Henderson, vice president of human resources. Gov. J.B. Pritzker said last week that all health care workers in the state must now get vaccines, and Southern Illinois Healthcare had announced a vaccine mandate for its workers before that.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/coronavirus/ct...-story.htm
