Name: Hospitals activate surge plans as L.A. County heads into pandemic’s most dangerous days
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Hospitals activate surge plans as L.A. County heads into pandemic’s most dangerous days

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GET BREAKING NEWS IN YOUR BROWSER. CLICK HERE TO TURN ON NOTIFICATIONS.XBy | | The Daily BreezeResponding to “terrifying” coronavirus caseload numbers, hospitals throughout the region are activating their surge plans to keep pace with the outbreak, public health officials said Wednesday, Dec. 2.Health Services Director Dr. Christina Ghaly said there was a real possibility the county could run out of intensive care unit beds in two to three weeks during Wednesday’s briefing, as the county reported 5,987 new cases and 40 associated deaths, bringing the county’s totals to 414,185 and 7,740, respectively.The number of people hospitalized for treatment climbed to a record 2,439 people. A state dashboard, which generally posts updated numbers a day earlier, placed the county’s figure at 2,572 hospitalizations. L.A. County isn’t alone — for the first time on Wednesday, the placed the number of people hospitalized nationwide at more than 100,000.But on Wednesday evening, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti provided more alarming news about how this second surge could overwhelm the healthcare system.Los Angeles County has close to 1,000 available hospital beds, but only 122 intensive-care unit beds based on current staffing, according to the Department of Health Services.Infections among healthcare workers, Ghaly added, have soared 71% since November and staffing depth could become an issue in the weeks ahead. But hospitals contacted Wednesday their surge plans were helping them to cope with the wave of cases and they were not currently experiencing staffing or supply shortages.“While we are in a better position now to deliver care, there are limits,” Ghaly said. “We are able to meet the demand. But the best thing you can do is stay home.”With L.A. County now experiencing its worst point of the pandemic, officials said, public health leaders doubled down on their most persistent messages: Stay home as much as possible and wear a face mask. The county has added waves of new restrictions in recent days — including and and public playgrounds — in response to the“We’re seeing terrifying increases in numbers in L.A. County,” said Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer, “that can only be turned around if businesses and residents do their part to slow the spread.”At Centinela Hospital Medical Center in Inglewood, patients have doubled in a week’s time, according to Molly Lawson, director of business development and marketing.“Our ICU units (COVID and non-COVID) are operating at 80% capacity,” Lawson said. “Based on immediate need, we reopened another dedicated COVID unit that had been closed mid-summer when the volumes were low. All state and local indicators suggest this is the eye of the storm. What we do today, how we comply with all of the COVID-19 guidelines and safety protocols has an immediate impact on what’s to come.”Among nine Providence Health System of Southern California hospitals that care for COVID-19 patients across the region, patients admitted with the coronavirus have grown from 207 to 520 people in the past month — amounting to the highest rates of patients at the hospital system yet. At Torrance’s Providence Little Company of Mary, COVID-19 patients have also doubled.But “at this point we are not at ICU capacity,” Patricia Aidem, Providence spokeswoman said. “Early last year, our hospitals created comprehensive surge plans that continue to guide efforts to expand care as the pandemic escalates. We do have the ability to expand into other areas of the hospitals, including nonpatient areas such as cafeteria dining rooms, if that ever should become necessary, and potentially to transfer patients among our hospitals.”In Long Beach, over the past month, up to 149 citywide as of Tuesday, Dec. 1.Sylvain Trepanier, Ph.D., RN, chief clinical officer of Providence Southern California, said the hospital system has been preparing for a surge for months.“We know if the time comes to stop conducting scheduled procedures that can be delayed. We have been hiring more temporary staff in preparation for this surge,” Trepanier said. “The majority of the temporary staff come from all over the country and are known as travel nurses.”On the bright side, the transmission rate of the virus — a number that relates to the potential for hospitalizations and not case rates overall — has declined slightly from a week ago going from 1.27 to 1.14. This means that for every one person who is infected, 1.14 people have the potential to become infected.The relative number of people currently infected with the virus has also declined slightly from 1 in 145 people reported last week to now 1 in 200. Ghaly said the discrepancy between increasingly higher number of daily cases and a declining infection rate had to do with various factors including better treatments and adherence to health orders.Earlier this week, officials at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center said it would serve as an L.A. County distribution site — because it possesses an ultracold storage unit capable of storing vaccine by Pfizer at minus-80 degrees Celsius, much colder than a common freezer.“We are putting special processes in place to make sure that we can receive this vaccine and keep it at those ultracold temperatures and thaw it at just the right time and reconstitute it, so it can be administered to those who need it,” said Dr. Jeff Smith, chief operating officer at Cedars-Sinai.Wednesday’s county coronavirus update did not include the latest figures from Long Beach and Pasadena, which operate their own health departments. Pasadena reported 61 new cases, bringing its total to 3,807; an additional fatality raised its death toll to 133. Long Beach lifting its total to 17,089; two additional deaths raised the city’s death toll to 279.Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated the current number of available hospital beds in L.A. County based on a statement attributed to L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti.&nbsp;for The Localist, our daily email newsletter with handpicked stories relevant to where you live. .Get the latest news delivered daily!Most PopularClose

GET BREAKING NEWS IN YOUR BROWSER. CLICK HERE TO TURN ON NOTIFICATIONS.XBy | | The Daily BreezeResponding to “terrifying” coronavirus caseload numbers, hospitals throughout the region are activating their surge plans to keep pace with the outbreak, public health officials said Wednesday, Dec. 2.Health Services Director Dr. Christina Ghaly said there was a real possibility the county could run out of intensive care unit beds in two to three weeks during Wednesday’s briefing, as the county reported 5,987 new cases and 40 associated deaths, bringing the county’s totals to 414,185 and 7,740,...

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David Rosenfeld

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Hospitals activate surge plans as L.A. County heads into pandemic’s most dangerous days

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