COVID-19 sends a flood of patients to Modesto hospital, straining staff and resources
It’s an unusual combination — hot weather and hospital emergency departments filled with people suffering from upper respiratory and gastrointestinal illness.
As the coronavirus delta variant infects more people in Stanislaus County, the emergency department traffic is soaring at Memorial Medical Center in Modesto, accompanied by a rise in people testing positive for COVID-19.
“We are at the highest volume I have seen at Memorial ever,” said Dr. Kanthi Kiran, medical director of the hospital’s emergency department.
From 270 to 280 people per day are coming through the doors, she said Thursday. The ED is set up for 220 patients daily, which is more like the normal count during the winter flu season.
“It is overwhelming our resources,” Kiran said. “We are getting everyone seen but it is incredibly taxing.”
On Thursday, Memorial had more than 60 patients on the hospital’s COVID-19 floor, intensive care units and a special area for probable cases.
Kiran said the hospital is testing more than 100 people per day for the coronavirus and 13 to 14 percent are positive. The hospital was down to 2 percent positivity before the delta variant surge began in July.
In addition to the COVID patients, the ED is getting the normal medical emergencies, the broken ankles, and chronic disease complications that may go untreated during a prolonged epidemic.
A high percentage or “almost all” of the COVID-positive patients are not vaccinated against the coronavirus, said Kiran, who urged local residents to get the shots and avoid a potentially deadly case of the contagious illness.
More than 90 percent of the COVID-infected coming to the hospital are not vaccinated, Kiran estimated.
“We are all asking the community to rally,” she said. “One way to protect each other is for everyone, who can to get vaccinated, to please get vaccinated.”
Thursday, case and hospitalization numbers rose again on Stanislaus County’s online dashboard, which showed 255 new cases and three deaths. COVID admissions at hospitals in the county climbed to 182 after being in the 30s in mid-July.
If this is a repeat of the December-January and summer 2020 surges, hospitalizations may keep climbing to extreme levels of 340 to 360.
After more than 17 months of pandemic conditions, it’s becoming more challenging to staff shifts in the emergency department, Kiran said. Employees go out on stress leave. Ambulance vehicles line up and wait to hand over patients to the hospital.
Hospital and health officials believe the surge can be slowed down if thousands of unvaccinated people roll up their sleeves and mask-wearing is again practiced in indoor public settings.
Dr. Donald Zweig, an assistant medical director in the Memorial ED, said he has seen one breakthrough case in a vaccinated person — a dialysis patient. Many of the patients hospitalized since the delta variant became dominant are younger adults. He said he admitted two children who needed hospital care.
The symptoms are miserable
The people infected with COVID have symptoms like cough, runny nose, shortness of breath and body aches. Some don’t have the upper respiratory symptoms but complain of vomiting and diarrhea.
The patients admitted are fighting pneumonia and not getting enough oxygen, Kiran said.
Even those who are sent home to isolate have a miserable illness. “They look bad,” Zweig said. “We have to delve into it to make sure nothing else is going on. It is not a mild disease.”
The physician pointed out that the vaccination can keep a person from getting a long-haul case of COVID-19. Rather than going away within weeks, some people struggle for months with COVID symptoms, including chest or stomach pain, cough, difficulty breathing, dizziness, heart palpitations and trouble concentrating.
The long-term effect on the person’s health is not known yet.
The physicians see a need for more education about the three coronavirus vaccines to allay fears and combat misinformation.
The Memorial staff members said they have not seen any people come in with a serious reaction to the vaccine.
According to the county’s dashboard, 60 percent of the county residents age 12 and older, who are eligible for the vaccine, have received at least one dose, leaving 40 percent without vaccine protection against the virus. Experts believe a full vaccination rate of 80 percent or more would prevent coronavirus surges.
There are many options for getting the free vaccination including pharmacies like CVS and SaveMart, county clinics and community health centers.
Kiran said patients in Memorial’s emergency department can get their first shot and an appointment for the second.
