No holiday break for area hospitals as capacity, ER challenges continue

The winter season is shaping up to be a busy one in regional hospital units and emergency rooms, as the fallout of an early and intense start to respiratory virus season cascades into the new year.

St. Thomas Elgin General Hospital has been operating at 100 per cent capacity in its inpatient beds since Dec. 20, vice president Craig Watkin said Thursday, as more patients with respiratory illnesses come through its doors.

“We are continuing to see our usual emergency room department patients, with conditions like abdominal pain or chest pain, but with the winter months we’re seeing increasing numbers of people with respiratory problems and trouble breathing,” said Watkin, vice-president of patient services and chief nursing officer.

The average emergency room wait time for non-urgent patients at the St. Thomas hospital is hovering at about two hours, Watkin said.

The hospital also is seeing the number of sick children flocking to its emergency room decline in recent weeks, after a surge of flu and respiratory syncytial virus starting in November put pressure on area hospitals.

“We did review our surge plans for pediatric patients because we were anticipating we’d continue to see high volumes. We have that planning in place in case something changes, but over the last couple of weeks we’ve seen a decrease,” Watkin said.

The average wait time to see a doctor in the urgent care center at St. Joseph’s Health Care London is hovering around three hours, the hospital said in a statement Thursday.

In a push to speed up patient flow through the centre, staff are completing as many necessary diagnostics tests as possible, including x-rays and lab work, before the patient sees the doctor, St. Joseph’s said.

At London Health Sciences Centre, officials were reporting wait times of 12.5 hours at its Victoria Hospital emergency room and 4.5 hours at its University Hospital site, according to a new online dashboard launched just before the busy holiday season.

LHSC’s online wait time estimates reflect the time a patient with a non-urgent condition, such as a sore throat, scrape or bruise, might encounter.

The emergency room wait time at Children’s Hospital was sitting at about an hour and 45 minutes Thursday afternoon.

Huron Perth Healthcare Alliance, which has hospital sites in Clinton, Seaforth St. Marys and Stratford, closed its Clinton emergency room an hour earlier Thursday followed by reduced hours, 8 am to 6 pm starting Friday amid ongoing staffing pressure.

Last Friday’s blizzard, which hit Huron and Perth counties particularly hard, took a serious toll on the hospital network, president and chief executive Andrew Williams said Thursday.

“Dec. 23, 24 and 25 were some of the most challenging days I have seen from a staffing perspective, certainly in my over 30 years in the region,” Williams said in an email.

“With all roads closed for three days, and approximately half the HPHA’s staffing complement living outside our four hospital communities, we had some people working close to 72 hours straight as they could not be replaced, nor go home.”

Williams said the volume of emergency department visits has been similar to previous years, but pediatric bed occupancy has been the greatest concern.

Huron Perth Healthcare Alliance expanded its pediatric unit by two beds, but is still holding some children in its emergency departments waiting on available beds, Williams said.

Bluewater Health, which has hospital sites in Sarnia and Petrolia, is reporting “high but manageable” patient volumes coming through its doors.

Dec. 27 has historically been the busiest day of the year at Bluewater Health, a pattern that held this year. The hospital network had about 200 visits that day, compared to about 120 each day from Dec. 24 to 26.

Bluewater Health is running at about 90 per cent capacity with no significant changes in its ER wait times, a spokesperson said Thursday.

Chatham-Kent Health Alliance is hovering at around 99 per cent capacity in its adult inpatient units and 86 per cent capacity in its pediatric unit.

“Our ER volumes overall have remained at pre-pandemic levels,” the hospital said in a statement Thursday. “However, we continue to see patients presenting to the ER that are more sick. . . . Higher acuity has become the issue and this contributes to far longer wait times for a bed.”

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