LHSC prepares to transfer patients to other hospitals as Omicron-fueled capacity crunch worsens
Stretched to its limit, the London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC) plans to ask smaller hospitals in the region for relief.
“The hospitals are at the maximal stress right now,” explains LHSC’s Dr. Adam Dukelow. “Hopefully the maximum stress.”
LHSC operates both University Hospital and Victoria Hospital in London.
Currently caring for 161 COVID patients, 24 in critical care, LHSC will create space by transferring patients to other hospitals in order to preserve its ability to offer highly specialized cardiac and neuroscience care.
“In the next 24 hours some patients will move, likely less than 10, but enough to create space,” says Dr. Dukelow.
Either COVID patients, or patients admitted for other reasons, will be transferred based on what other hospitals are able to accept.
On Tuesday, the Middlesex-London Health Unit indicated that the Omicron wave appears to be plateauing.
Corresponding hospitalizations can peak more than a week after spread begins to wane in the community.
During previous waves of the COVID-19 pandemic, hospitals in St. Thomas, Strathroy, Stratford, and Hanover have been among those to accept patients from LHSC, but now they’re also stretched thin and facing uncertainty about the number of patients that will be admitted in the coming days.
“It’s a matter of who is stretched more,” admits Dr. Dukelow. “Some hospitals may have just one or two beds that they can help us out with, it’s a matter of maximizing capacity in the system.”
A temporary field hospital inside the Agriplex had 144 beds, but after sitting idle for a year and a half it was decommissioned in early December.
Dr. Dukelow explains that over the course of the pandemic other strategies, like transferring patients between hospitals, developed as better options to address a capacity crunch.
He believes the Agriplex site wouldn’t have been a solution to the current situation.
“We can actually stand up more beds within the walls of the London Health Sciences Centre that have all the equipment, like oxygen, of a standard hospital.”
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Air traveller complaints to Canadian Transportation Agency hit new high
The Canadian Transportation Agency has hit a record high of more than 71,000 complaints in a backlog. The quasi-judicial regulator and tribunal tasked with settling disputes between customers and the airlines says the backlog is growing because the number of incoming complaints keeps increasing.
LIVE @ 1:15 PT B.C. premier to give announcement related to public drug use
B.C.'s premier is scheduled to give an update Friday about public drug use in the province.
Orca calf that was trapped in B.C. lagoon for weeks swims free
An orca whale calf that has been stranded in a B.C. lagoon for weeks after her pregnant mother died swam out on her own early Friday morning.
AFN chief says Air Canada offered a 15% discount after her headdress was mishandled
After the Assembly of First Nations' national chief complained to Air Canada about how staffers treated her and her ceremonial headdress on a flight this week, she says the airline responded by offering a 15 per cent discount on her next flight.
Sophie Gregoire Trudeau on navigating post-political life, co-parenting and freedom
Sophie Gregoire Trudeau says there is 'still so much love' between her and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, as they navigate their post-separation relationship co-parenting their three children.
Flight attendant indicted in attempt to record teen girl in airplane bathroom
An American Airlines flight attendant was indicted Thursday after authorities said he tried to secretly record video of a 14-year-old girl using an airplane bathroom last September.
76ers All-Star centre Joel Embiid says he has Bell's palsy
Philadelphia 76ers All-Star centre Joel Embiid has been diagnosed with Bell’s palsy, a form of facial paralysis he says has affected him since before the play-in tournament.
DEVELOPING Bird flu outbreaks: WHO weighs in on public health risk
The current overall public health risk posed by the H5N1 bird flu virus is low, the World Health Organization said on Friday, but urged countries to stay alert for cases of animal-to-human transmission.
Island near Mull of Kintyre for sale for US$3.1 million
An idyllic 453-acre private island is up for sale off the west coast of Scotland and it comes with sandy beaches, puffins galore, seven houses, a pub, a helipad and a flock of black-faced sheep.