OCH adds a mobile triage unit

In an effort to more effectively serve patients in the emergency room, Ohio County Healthcare is setting up a mobile unit in front of the hospital in close proximity to the emergency department.

This unit will serve as an ER annex for the treatment of COVID-19 patients. They project to have the annex operational by the end of the week and plan to begin treating patients there starting this weekend.

“As part of our continued infectious control measures, we want to be able to simultaneously treat COVID-19 patients and other medical emergencies that will arise,” said CeCe Robinson, OCH director of community relations.

Patients exhibiting COVID-19 symptoms will be triaged and treated as appropriate in the ER annex. Those requiring a more advanced level of care will be transferred inside to the ER department, Robinson said.

There will be signage outside to help patients determine where they should be seen.

“Our emergency room is open and available to treat emergency situations and we hope to utilize this emergency annex for the triage and treatment of COVID-19 patients as appropriate,” she said.

Typically the level of patient who would be seen in the annex would be a patient who was triaged as a patient who was not critical enough to require hospitalization. Those who are thought to require admission would then be treated in the ER and admitted as an inpatient, Robinson said.

The annex will be staffed 24 hours a day seven days a week. OCH has rented this unit and will evaluate its need on a month-to-month basis.

Anyone seeking COVID-19 testing is encouraged to utilize OCH’s quick care or provider partners.

Because of high ER volumes and capacity

levels, a holding area is also being created for patients that meet admissions criteria to stay in until a bed becomes available.

“These are all part of our emergency management plans,” Robinson said. “Based on the acuity of patients and the number of patients OCH is treating, our leadership team will implement different phases of the emergency plan to make sure we can treat all patients both COVID and non-COVID.

The number of patients at OCH fluctuates daily, Robinson said. At one point over the past weekend, the ER was completely full and all of the inpatient beds were full. On Tuesday, OCH had 12 inpatients.

“It is a fluctuating number and we want to make sure we are prepared for all scenarios because it can change rapidly.”

These measures come locally as new cases of COVID-19 continue to surge both in the state and county.

Kentucky reported more new cases of COVID-19 last week than in any week of the pandemic thus far with more than 29,000.

In total, Kentucky has had 577,051 positive cases of COVID-19 and 7,765 deaths.

The current state positivity rate is 13.66%

According to the Green River District Health Department, Ohio County reported 242 new cases and one death last week.

Ohio County has experienced 3,372 total cases of COVID-19 and 59 deaths. The daily incidence rate for the county is still in the red critical zone at 125.627.

Of the seven-county district consisting of Daviess, Hancock, Henderson, McLean, Ohio, Union and Webster, there were 1,618 new cases last week.

“We continue to be hit harder and harder with this delta variant. We’re seeing it all across the United States, now reaching a daily average of more than 100,000 COVID-19 hospitalizations for the first time since the winter peak,” said Gov. Beshear. “This isn’t just people getting COVID; it’s them being sick enough to end up in the hospital.”