Worcester Business Journal

wbjournal.com | March 30, 2020 | Worcester Business Journal 9 W H E A L T H C A R E F O C U S Greater Worcester hospital bed needs According to a Harvard Global Health Institute study of all hospital referral regions around the country, the Worcester referral region normally has 425 available hospital beds and 43 intensive care unit beds. If hospital officials are able to reduce capacity in typically occupied beds by 50% by taking measures like cancelling elective procedures and pushing out non-coronavirus patients, those availability numbers rise to 975 and 106. The researchers then ran scenarios on the rate and spread of the coronavirus infection in the Worcester region to determine if this would be enough. In two of the nine scenarios, the Worcester region have enough hospital beds, and in zero of the scenarios does it have enough ICU beds. Source: Harvard Global Health Institute Hospital beds needed 589 904 1,179 1,768 1,807 1,807 2,711 3,615 5,422 ICU beds needed 126 194 253 379 387 388 581 775 1,162 Best-case scenario: It takes 18 months for 20% of the population to be infected. It takes 12 months for 20% of the population to be infected. It takes 18 months for 40% of the population tobe infected. It takes 18 months for 60% of the population to be infected. It takes six months for 20% of the population to be infected. It takes 12 months for 40% of the population to be infected. It takes 12 months for 60% of the population to be infected. It takes six months for 40% of the population to be infected. Worst-case scenario: It takes six months for 60% of the population to be infected. to predict the number of people who will actually catch the disease, as much will depend on how effective the social distancing measures will be. However, Marc Lipsitch, a professor of epidemi- ology at Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health, has estimated that 40% to 70% of the world's population could become infected. "Our goal is to give hospital leaders and policy makers a clear sense of when they will hit capacity, and strategic information on how to prepare for rising numbers of patients with COVID-19 needing care," Dr. Ashish Jha, the director of the Harvard Global Health Institute, said in a statement. Working to add space Hospitals have already taken some action to add capacity by postponing most elective procedures for at least a few weeks, and MetroWest Medical Center has indefinitely called off a plan to eliminate acute care services at its Leonard Morse Hospital in Natick. Milford Regional Medical Center is creating a temporary 3,800-square-foot facility at the back of the hospital to accommodate emergency department patients, and UMass Memorial Medical Center in Worcester has moved some intensive care beds to create a contiguous area for treating coronavirus patients. Steward Health Care, the parent company for Nashoba Valley Medical Center in Ayer, said it began stockpiling ventilators and personal protective equipment when the virus first emerged in the United States. It is also planning to send coronavirus patients needing inpatient care at any of its area hospitals to one centralized facility, Carney Hospital in Boston. at will allow other Steward hospitals to continue caring for other patients while dedicating the right coronavirus resources in one place, the company said. UMass Memorial Medical Center and Saint Vincent Hospital worked with Worcester city officials to plan for using the DCU Center for caring for coronavirus patients if or when the additional space is needed. e Worcester hospital referral region has more than 652,000 adults, of which 81,000 – or 12% – are projected by the Harvard researchers to need hospitalization. More than 17,000 people, or nearly 3% of the population, could need an ICU bed. Most of Central Massachusetts is in Worcester's hospital referral region, but much of MetroWest is in Boston's and part of the Blackstone Valley is in Providence's. ose areas, too, are slated to see major shortages. Boston, for example, is 20th worst among referral regions for total hospital beds, and 114th for ICU beds. Providence is 38th worst for total beds and 48th worst for ICU beds. Equipment shortages already loom Hospitals are already reporting short- ages in some equipment, including in so-called N95 surgical masks at UMass Memorial Medical Center in Worcester, with hospital leaders advising practi- tioners to reuse masks for multiple pa- tients if necessary. at step isn't normal- ly done but has been deemed acceptable for a limited time by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. UMass Memorial has told provid- ers to use albuterol inhalers only for patients who've tested positive for coro- navirus or those under investigation with a high likelihood of a positive test. Other inhalers called nebulizers should be used for all other patients, such as those with asthma or chronic obstruc- tive pulmonary disease. Marlborough Hospital has asked the Corridor 9/495 Regional Chamber Central Mass. hospital beds UMass Memorial Medical Center, Worcester.............. 730 MetroWest Medical Center, Framingham/Natick ............. 340 Saint Vincent Hospital, Worcester .......................................... 303 Milford Regional Medical Center............................................... 160 HealthAlliance-Clinton Hospital, Clinton, Leominster, Fitchburg ........................................... 144 Harrington Hospital, Southbridge ...................................... 119 Heywood Hospital, Gardner ........... 101 Marlborough Hospital ....................... 79 Nashoba Valley Medical Center, Ayer ....................................... 40 Athol Hospital .................................... 21 Hospital Acute-care beds Note: MetroWest Medical Center is part of the Boston hospital referral region Source: Massachusetts Center for Health Information and Analysis (2018) of Commerce and the Marlborough Economic Development Corp. for help obtaining face masks, face shielding and ventilators, according to the chamber. Hospitals have also reported blood shortages. e Massachusetts Nurses Association has lauded the delayed Leonard Morse Hospital closure and delaying unneces- sary procedures but said there still ap- pears to be a major shortage in capacity. "e potential surge in volume of patients with possible exposure to or symptoms of COVID-19 illness still very much has the capacity to overwhelm our healthcare system," the union said in a letter to Gov. Charlie Baker. "e state should direct health care facilities to halt all planned bed, unit and facility closures. We should instead be looking at ways to increase capacity," the group said. Getting a mass testing system in place in Worcester County has been important in getting an understanding of the coronavirus spread.

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