MADISON, Alabama — The Huntsville Hospital System is caring for over 300 people with COVID-19 right now.
Hospital officials say ICU beds are full at almost every hospital in the system. They expect to be taking care of very sick COVID patients well into January.
While Madison Hospital officials say healthcare workers are in good spirits, these record numbers are creating challenges.
Right now, Madison Hospital is treating 30 COVID-19 patients. It's only a 90 bed hospital. Even as the number of patients climbs, the hospital is down about 15 to 20 employees a day due to the virus.
Madison Hospital President, Mary Lynne Wright, said, "We are a small hospital. We have about 650 employees total, and if you've got 15 to 20 out on any given day, that is significant for us."
Hospitalization numbers have not been this high since the summer spike, and the numbers just keep climbing.
"I think what you will see is clinical staff that may be in more of administrative roles now, they may have to come out of those administrative roles and do more hands on clinical care," said Wright.
Wright says if hospitals become overwhelmed, they will end up with hall beds in the emergency room. If that happens, they may also have to hold patients in their recovery room in surgery if they don't have a bed on the floor.
Fortunately, they are not completely overwhelmed yet, but treating these COVID patients every day is taking toll on the nurses.
"Everybody is tired. I'm tired of it, and I'm not upstairs taking care of patients every day," said Wright. "You have to keep thinking okay, we are taking care of people, we are doing it the right way."
Even with this current surge, hospital officials say they believe we still haven't seen the expected spike from Thanksgiving.
Wright said, "We are trying to think creatively outside the box. What are we going to do next, what are we going to do if this continues and we have more and more people that are sick?"
Right now, Madison Hospital is not cancelling any elective surgeries, but they have slowed down the number of patients that can be admitted every day. That's because they don't know how many patients will come into the emergency room. They say around 120 people a day are coming through the ER right now. If the number of COVID-19 patients continues to go up, they will likely have to stop elective surgeries.
Because they are so busy, hospital officials say people can expect longer wait times in the ER.
Despite the numbers, hospitals say they do have enough PPE right now.
They say the Huntsville Hospital System is preparing to vaccinate their staff as soon as they receive the vaccines.
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