Texas hospitals, staff maxed out with C-19

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COVID-19 rates in Texas hit record highs this past week with the number of daily cases reaching higher than since the beginning of the pandemic. Over 1 million Texans have now tested positive for COVID-19, and with holidays approaching, experts warn that the current surge of cases will swell even further.

Already the pandemic has killed more than 19,000 people in Texas, most over the age of 70.

Hospitals are also seeing more patients ill with the virus, putting a renewed strain on caregivers across the state. In Amarillo, hospitals are at past capacity.

“The numbers in the hospital are scary,” Chief Medical Officer of Northwest Texas Hospital Dr. Brian Weiss said. “As we gain patients, we’re losing staff. Bad combination.”

Northwest Texas Hospital in Amarillo is suffering from an employee shortage due to virus exposure among staff. Over 100 staff members in that hospital alone are in quarantine due to possible exposures. Amarillo’s COVID-19 hospitalization rate has soared to more than 30 percent.

As of Friday, there were 10,410 cumulative confirmed cases in Potter County and 8,083 in Randall County. Recoveries at 11,999 and 217 have died. There are 6,277 active cases, with 343 new cases on Friday, 183 recovered and 11 deaths.

Lubbock faces a similar challenge as their hospitalization rate has remained above 15 percent, the rate set by the governor to determine business capacity, for more than three weeks. Lubbock hospitals have resorted to standing up tents to serve short-term patients.

As of Monday afternoon, the city of Lubbock confirmed 322 new cases, 253 recoveries and four additional deaths. The total number of cases in Lubbock County is 26,158: 4,838 active, 21,030 listed as recovered and 277 total deaths.

At that time, there were a combined 20 open hospital beds and 38 patients holding for beds at University Medical Center and Covenant Health System.

Dr. Ron Cook, chair of family medicine at Texas Tech University’s Health and Sciences Center.says the newly erected field hospitals in Lubbock and the imported medical staff from the state won’t stop the numbers from climbing.

“I don’t care how many field hospitals we put up. I don’t care how many staff the state sends up. Those are temporary. One of them has to leave in 10 days — one of the intensivists has to leave in 10 days because they have another job," Cook said. "If we do not slow down the number of infections before they get to the hospital, this will continue.”

Dallas County hit a high for new cases in a single day this week, logging more than 1,400 positive test results last Tuesday. Hospitals in El Paso are filling with coronavirus patients, and the morgue has reached capacity.

In North Texas, too, the forecast for the coming weeks is dire. UT Southwestern scientists are predicting that hospitalizations and daily case counts in Dallas County will set records in the days leading up to Thanksgiving.

While hospitals in the Dallas-Fort Worth area say they have enough beds and personal protective gear, executives are competing for staff with other parts of the state that are experiencing surges.

“You can have all the beds you want, but if you can’t staff them, what good are they?” said Steve Love, president and CEO of the Dallas-Fort Worth Hospital Council.

Moore County Hospital District in Dumas is managing more than a rural hospital can handle. With space and staff for 11 coronavirus patients, the administrator is searching to find open beds at larger hospitals in Amarillo. When those hospitals are full, the staff scours for space in Midland, Wichita Falls and Lubbock, then in Dallas, Denver, Albuquerque, Oklahoma City – even Kansas City, Missouri. Some patients have died waiting for space.

According to Alan Morgan, CEO of the National Rural Health Association, rural hospitals are designed for primary care, general surgery, not a global pandemic.

As anyone who lives in a rural area knows, small hospitals are often understaffed and financially vulnerable – and located in towns where people are more likely to ignore precautions such as masks and social distancing at churches, grocery stores and public events.

Many of the nation’s nearly 1,800 rural hospitals lack the equipment, workforce and expertise to hand a surge of COVID-19 patients, especially with nurses and doctors getting sick.

It isn’t that the larger metro hospitals don’t want to help provide beds, they just don’t have the ICU beds and health care workers to take on more COVID-19 patients. And with winter and flu season coming on quickly, medical facilities are planning for a rough season when extreme weather could halt transfers and make it difficult to bring in traveling nurses or stateprovided health care workers. Should that happen, the health system could shut down clinics.

Rural hospitals have long sought to address the shortages of staff. They also have struggled financially with 17 rural hospitals closing in 2020 and 136 over the past decade, according to the National Rural Health Association. During the pandemic, hospitals’ finances took a hit after cutting off non-emergency operations to make room for COVID-19 patients.

A concern that many healthcare officials have had is the asymptomatic spread of the virus. Several studies have shown that at least 40 to 50 percent of people who test positive for COVID-19 have no symptoms. Medical experts say asymptomatic spread may well be contributing to the current spikes.

State health and emergency management leaders have surged medical supplies and additional health care workers to West Texas in the last month. Governor Greg Abbott says more help is on the way for doctors and patients. He expects Texas patients will have access to Regeneron and another therapeutic issued by Eli Lilly as soon as next week.

Abbott said, “Bottom line is even before vaccines become available, we will have these therapeutic drugs that will be able to treat people who get COVID and improve them. And that will reduce the people with COVID, reduce hospitalizations, and it will reduce fatalities.”