HOSPITALS Crowds mean wait for rooms

If patients are admitted and there is no regular hospital room, a wait of 24 hours could happen.
By WILLIAM K. ALCORN
VINDICATOR HEALTH REPORTER
YOUNGSTOWN -- A glut of severe respiratory and pulmonary problems has resulted in a shortage of hospital beds. Some patients have laid for a long time on gurneys in the emergency room -- after being diagnosed and treated -- while waiting for a regular room.
Linda Hartzell of Canfield said her father went to St. Elizabeth Health Center's emergency room with shortness of breath, high blood pressure and chest pains at 5:30 a.m. Feb. 25. He was told by 9 a.m. that he would be admitted, but did not get a regular room until 23 hours later.
Hartzell said another man was brought into emergency at 3 a.m. that Monday, and was on a gurney in emergency until 5 p.m. Tuesday before getting a regular room. Two hours later, his doctor released him from the hospital, she said.
The two situations may be out of the ordinary, but Chris McCarty, Humility of Mary Health Partners spokesman, acknowledged that there could be lengthy waits for hospital rooms at St. Elizabeth.
"As you can imagine, any day can bring different levels of volume. If someone comes into emergency and we admit them, and if there are no rooms ... having to wait 24 hours, it really could happen," McCarty said.
"In today's hospital climate, with insurance and reimbursement changes, patients are overall much sicker. If there is a big influx of new patients, we can't just discharge the people who are here," he said.
Working with Northside: McCarty said St. Elizabeth, which has been running full continually, has a working relationship with Forum Health Northside Medical Center. He said St. Elizabeth and Northside keep in close contact, and ambulance companies are aware of which can best handle patients.
McCarty and his counterpart at Forum Health, Debora Bishop, both said that if patients have to spend time in emergency waiting for a regular bed, the care afforded them is the same.
"As always, we have the proper staffing to provide high quality, compassionate care," McCarty said.
They attributed the current shortage of beds to the overall reduction in hospital beds that occurred in the 1980s and 1990s in all hospitals.
They said emergency rooms at their Trumbull County hospitals have also been very busy.
Crowded conditions in the emergency room also existed at Northside in recent days, said Bonnie Lambert, president of the Youngstown General Duty Nurse Association. Lambert is a labor and delivery nurse who previously worked on the surgical floor and in orthopedics.
Bishop, Forum Health manager of marketing and community relations, said Northside is experiencing a higher than normal number of emergency visits, especially on weekends.
But, she said: "From what I heard, there have not been extended waits for regular beds. We make every attempt to get patients in quickly."
Shortage made worse: Lambert said there is a general shortage of hospital beds. In Northside's case, the shortage is made worse because eight or 10 beds are lost while the cancer unit is being renovated.
It all adds to the frustration in emergency, Lambert said. The last thing patients want when they are sick is the bedlam of emergency.Lambert said the beds at Northside are full. She said hospital administrators told her that on the weekend of Feb. 23-24 the patient census, normally 250 to 265, was more than 300.
And, because of the shortage of nurses, they are working more hours and getting sick too, she said.
alcorn@vindy.com