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Originally Posted by loochy
Yes, that 1% makes a huge difference. Remember, ICUs are not large, so just a small influx of patients can overrun one. I'd say they range anywhere from 5 to 40 beds. When you hear that "ICUs are full", that doesn't mean everyone in town is sick, it means the ICU reached that smallish capacity.
The thing is that the ICUs are designed to always be somewhat near capacity (because it's incredibly expensive to have beds sitting empty). The forecasts for capacity were based on pre-covid days, so this is throwing a wrench into all of that forecasting. Previously, they'd just send overflow to the next nearest hospital, but they cant do that anymore because those ICUs are full too.
Now, the problem is where to put car crash victims or gunshot victims when the ICU is full of insulin-resistant fatties that could have taken a shot to stay out of that ICU.
In general, the problem doesn't effect a huge number of people, but when it's your turn and you accidentally chop your arm off with a band saw, you'll really be wishing those people took their shots.
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Another issue from what I've seen first hand is staffing. ICU are generally. 2 pts to 1 nurse. So if you have a 70 bed ICU but only have enough nurses to take care of 50 of those beds the hospital will consider that full.
Nurses are leaving for different reasons. Some went to clinic settings or DRs office where they don't have to deal with COVID to the degree they do in the hospital. Others went to teach some retired if they could. Some have left to go travel as the money is insane. 3x the amount they would nornally make so they opted to cash in while they could. Its not this mass exodus but it's enough that it does effect how many pts a hospital can take.