HUNTSVILLE, Ala. — It's a plea we've been hearing for months from health care workers: Don't come to the emergency room unless you have emergency. Don't come to the ER for a COVID test. Don't come to the ER with minor COVID symptoms like a stuffy nose.
Huntsville Hospital is again pleading with the public about emergency room usage as patient numbers climb. The message?
Please don't visit the ER for COVID testing or for symptoms or reasons that do not require emergent care. If you are experiencing non-life threatening COVID symptoms such as a sore throat or stuffy nose, please stay home or consider other options, including your primary care physician, an urgent care clinic or the Fever & Flu Clinic on Governors Drive.
Emergency rooms are dealing with an influx of patients, and there are a couple of reasons why this is hard on hospital staff, who have been dealing with stress like this for almost two years.
Dr. Sherrie Squyres, Huntsville Hospital Emergency Room Director, says, "We are short-staffed, we face challenges like most emergency departments in the country right now. We are short-staffed over the last year in 2021. We lost 45 of our nurses to other jobs. You know there's a lot of opportunity for nurses out there to travel or to take less challenging positions. I mean, our place is a tough place to work these days."
The main problem? People coming to the emergency room for the wrong reasons. Squyres says, "We are not where you should come to get a COVID test if you have sniffles and sore throat. If you're short of breath, if you're sick, then you do need to come to us and that's what we want to be there for. We are the resource that you need when you are sick enough that you feel you may need hospitalization and that's when you want to come to the emergency department or call 911 if you either can't get there by another method or you're that sick."
Health professionals say they aren't pushing people away...they're just redirecting them for non-emergency care. Huntsville Hospital President and COO Tracy Doughty says, "Definitely call when you need to, but for other illnesses that can be taken care of by urgent care center, our primary care doctor, please use those resources as well. ER's across the region and across the state have been overran the last couple of weeks. And so everybody's help is much needed."
"We are seeing record numbers of patients with COVID symptoms come to the ER, which is resulting in significantly longer wait times for all patients, including those with other medical emergencies," the hospital system said in its notice.
"If you are experiencing non-life threatening COVID symptoms such as a sore throat and stuffy nose, please stay home. Consider contacting your primary care doctor or an urgent care clinic if you need treatment for cold symptoms or non-life-threatening COVID symptoms."
The hospital system has already restricted its visitation policies and canceled in-patient elective surgeries as COVID hospitalizations continue to rise. The system reported 212 COVID-19 inpatients system-wide on January 4.
On January 5, the Alabama Department of Public Health reported the state has a 7-day moving percentage of positivity in COVID testing of 41%. As of January 5, there have been 16,503 reported COVID-19 cases in Alabama.