The people who run Ontario’s hospitals are all hoping the health system will not be flooded with COVID-19 patients, but they are planning for the possibility it will.
The people who run Ontario’s hospitals are all hoping the health system will not be flooded with COVID-19 patients, but they are planning for the possibility that it will.
Hospital administrators, doctors and nurses have for weeks been poring over their pandemic plans and getting ready to put them into action. Those plans involve redeploying staff, postponing scheduled surgeries, moving patients who don’t need acute care and ensuring adequate supplies of protective equipment and ventilators.
“Our entire focus is completely shifted wherever possible on preparing for the growth of COVID-19 cases,” said Dr. Kevin Smith, chief executive of the University Health Network (UHN) in Toronto. “The entire health care system has mobilized to address what we anticipate to be a very challenging time.”
Smith and his colleagues across the province have cast a wary eye on Italy, where the rapid spread of COVID-19 overwhelmed hospitals within weeks because of the sheer numbers of patients who needed intensive care beds and ventilators.
“We’re acting now but also we continue to plan for the future, about what could the next four weeks, six weeks, 12 weeks or longer look like,” said Dr. Joshua Tepper, CEO of the 431-bed North York General Hospital.
“What happens if we start to see a lot of people who are quite unwell?” said Tepper. “How would we organize the hospital? How would we have the right equipment and the right team in place?”
