The increasing number of COVID cases in Windsor-Essex is putting a huge strain on the health care sector.
Windsor Regional Hospital says as of Monday, it is pausing all non-urgent surgeries due to a rise in COVID patients being admitted, and a potential shortage of acute care beds.
“We will continue to reassess our capacity for surgeries based on volumes on a regular basis,” said Dr. Wassim Saad, WRH Chief of Staff. “We are doing our best to keep bed capacity available as our patient volumes increase during the second wave of this COVID-19 pandemic, while also conserving our hospital resources for the most urgent needs.”
Day surgeries, where a patient can go home the same day as the procedure, were stopped during the first wave of the pandemic in March but officials say that will not be the case this time around.
The Chatham-Kent Health Alliance has said it is willing and able to offer ICU beds to Windsor-area patients if need be, but there’s no word yet if or when that might happen.
The province provided surge funding for 20 additional ICU beds to CKHA this fall, beds which CEO Lori Marshall says are “regional in nature” and can be used for patient transfers from other health care facilities when needed.
Windsor-Essex Public Health is reporting 104 new cases of COVID-19 today with 37 people in hospital.
