Published: Just now
Five out of six emergency hospitals in Stockholm are on standby and several regions are stepping up reinforcements as the Epiphany approaches.
It is one of the busiest days of the year.
– Patient safety is threatened, says Kent Sandström at Norrland University Hospital.
The spread of infection in combination with the Christmas and New Year holidays has put Sweden’s healthcare staff in a tough situation. More and more people have been infected by covid-19 and contracted seasonal flu and the RS virus.
Healthcare staff around the country are now sounding the alarm that the care places and staffing are not enough to meet the large influx of patients.
50 sick patients were left without care at Danderyd’s overcrowded emergency department in the intervening days. At the same time, the toughest days of the year, Epiphany, are approaching, when the number of patients has increased historically.
Värmland and Västra Götaland have raised their readiness to reinforcement mode. In Umeå, there is still a high load on the emergency department.
“Security Threatened”
In the intervening days, Norrland University Hospital in Umeå was forced to cancel planned operations and doctor’s visits to free up space in the emergency department.
– The situation is not patient safe. The treatment time is longer in the emergency department for elderly and seriously ill patients as there is a great shortage of care places at the hospital, says Kent Sandström, deputy head of department at the emergency department at Norrland University Hospital in Umeå.
The situation is unchanged until the long weekend, he says.
– We do not have enough personnel resources, which means that patient safety is threatened. We don’t have time to keep everyone under surveillance or isolate all covid-infected people to single rooms. People are worried about how long the staff will be able to work.
Sick leave challenging
The search pressure for the hospitals’ emergency departments in Region Skåne is increasing in line with the spread of flu, RS virus and covid-19. Preparations are now being made to deal with the upcoming Epiphany weekend, the region writes in a press release.
Since a couple of weeks ago, five out of six emergency hospitals in Stockholm have been put on staff mode – among the worst affected is Danderyd hospital. Christophe Pedroletti, CEO of Danderyd hospital, says that they have opened more care places.
– We have around 90 patients with covid-19 in inpatient care now and 20 with influenza. Many of the staff are sick, but we have staffed up considerably for the Epiphany weekend. It is one of the toughest weekends of the year.
The emergency room at Karolinska in Huddinge is the only one in Stockholm that is not put on staff mode. But the emergency department has had many patients from time to time who have had to wait for a place of care, according to Caroline Kevin, operations manager for nursing at Akuten in Huddinge.
– The large sickness absence in the employee groups makes the situation challenging, she says.