'Please worry about your neighbor': Ohio hospitals feeling strain from COVID-19 spread
Source: Cincinnati
COLUMBUS Ohio hospital leaders say they have enough personal protective equipment, hospital beds and medications to treat COVID-19 patients in the state's third surge of the virus.
But they are concerned about having enough health care workers as cases climb and hospitalizations double or triple every few weeks.
"When they have to quarantine, they cant be at the bedside," said incoming Ohio Department of Health Chief Medical Director Dr. Bruce Vanderhoff. "We need your help with masking, distancing and hand hygiene."
Ohio set another record for currently hospitalized COVID-19 patients on Monday: 2,533, including 628 in intensive care units.
Read more: https://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2020/11/09/ohio-gov-mike-dewine-hospital-leaders-covid-19-surge-nov-9/6221687002/
sheshe2
(83,387 posts)They are overwhelmed and understaffed. I have family in another state that work ICU.
As for Ohio? You voted for this. You voted for trump and a hoax that is not a hoax.
du_grad
(221 posts)I am from the Toledo area and Biden won handily there. It is the rural areas that are brainwashed. There is an extreme disconnect between the cities and rural Ohio and it's not going to go away anytime soon.
Please don't lump ALL of us in the Trump camp.
sheshe2
(83,387 posts)I recognize that parts of the state are red and blue. I am horrified what your hospitals and care workers are going through. I am horrified that your death toll will rise.
I am saddened that the majority of your state voted for him.
I wish you all well. Where a mask. Here in MA it is a mandate and I have worn one since March. I have not seen one person without one.
Stay safe, it is going to get worse before it gets better, Fauci said this winter will be dark.
du_grad
(221 posts)Believe me, I don't shop much in brick and mortar stores. I do go to the grocery store because I can't get what I want half the time ordering online. I bought some N95's in January when you still could get them. I felt ridiculous ordering them at the time but was glad that I did. We also had some from 2013 when the bird flu was going around. I am careful with them and carefully reuse them.
Gov. DeWine, when it comes right down to it, is still a Republican. He just can't quite get the balls to give a statewide mask mandate. The city of Toledo has a mask mandate though. I have seen some very inventive ways of "wearing masks." One guy at Kroger had a bandana covering only his lower lip . I see many with their noses sticking out. I see a few keeping covid away from their chins. I just walk on. It's not worth getting into any kind of confrontation with stupidity.
I am a retired clinical laboratory microbiologist. My former coworkers are the ones doing the covid testing. I am a member of a large Facebook lab group with members from all over the US and some from outside the US. One poor tech said they are putting in 100 hour weeks because of the extreme shortage of technologists to perform testing. There are many jobs posted for traveling techs now. The hospitals are getting desperate. Our pay never was quite up to what RN's made. Some of the offers for traveling techs are around $2,000 and up per WEEK. The molecular testing requires a certain skill level that is in high demand. There is no way I would go back to work and deal with this kind of stress now. Please realize that covid testing is on TOP of the heavy workload that exists for most clinical laboratories nowadays. People quit and management won't or can't replace them. Budgets are strained at hospitals because outpatient procedures put big holes in budgets last spring. There is a shortage of critical care RN's also. Our daughter is an RN who works in MICU. Not all nurses have the ability to work in MICU. Nurses are not interchangeable cogs in a wheel. Critical care nursing is a specialty that takes a lot of training. Nurses are getting burned out and leaving the field. My daughter sees it happening where she works. She is bidding on a job outside the ICU because she is getting burned out.
From what I have read about this illness, the key thing is to reduce your inoculum of viral particles. If you wear a mask and wash your hands a lot, and keep your hands away from your face, you are doing a lot to reduce your exposure. Don't hang out in crowded places where people have to take off masks to eat. There's a lot of saliva misting around in the air in restaurants while people eat and drink. They are crowded. They are not places to hang out in. Get takeout and take it home. It's much safer.
Be well everyone.
I am in St. Louis and our area is a blue island in a red state. Our hospitals get to handle the overflow from the rural areas that cannot bother to take care of themselves and wear masks.
CanonRay
(14,040 posts)In every state.