Several Metro Manila hospital ERs fill with non-COVID patients

Despite the low number of COVID-19 patients being admitted to hospitals, non-COVID-19 patients are filling the emergency rooms (ERs) of several hospitals in Metro Manila.

According to Vonne Aquino’s report on “24 Oras Weekend” on Sunday, Philippine General Hospital (PGH) Spokesperson Dr. Jonas del Rosario said that patients in their emergency room had doubled.

“Punong-puno po ang ER namin. Ang aming allocated ER beds ay 70 pero ngayon halos 200% na ang capacity—mga 140 patients ang nasa ER. Mga ilang linggo na rin na ganito ang sitwasyon,” Del Rosario said.

(Our emergency room is full. Our allocated ER beds was 70. But now it has reached almost 200% capacity—about 140 patients are in the ER. This has been the situation for several weeks.)

Based on PGH’s data as of June 4, pneumonia was the leading disease among ER patients, followed by diabetes, and trauma.

The ward in the Department of Medicine and Neurology, meanwhile, had nearly 200 patients admitted.

“Talagang real emergency na ang papasok sa ER at minsan kailangan silang resuscitate agad… kung puno ang ER minsan hindi sila nabibigyan ng tamang espasyo para sila ay ma-resuscitate,” Del Rosario added.

(Only ‘real’ emergencies would enter the ER and sometimes patients must be resuscitated immediately. If the ER is full, patients could not be given the appropriate space to be resuscitated.)

To minimize the patients inside its emergency room, the PGH would stop accepting walk-in patients.

It also asked the public to call the Department of Health’s (DOH) National Patient Navigation and Referral Center hotline at 1115 to help them find a hospital.

Uncoordinated transfers are also prohibited, the PGH added.

Other hospitals

The Ospital ng Maynila Medical Center (OMMC) also experienced the same problem with most of its patients admitted to the emergency room having cardiovascular disease and respiratory infections.

“It has been almost 2 years… so ‘yung mga supposedly for elective na mga cases noon na-backlog sila, they would come to emergency room na whether in pain o kaya mas malala na ‘yung situation ng supposedly nila na kaso before, so nagiging emergency cases nila,” Director Dr. Karl Oliver Laqui of OMMC said.

(It has been almost 2 years… so the supposedly elective cases back then were backlogged. They would come to the emergency room whether in pain or their situation had worsened from what it was before. So they become emergency cases.)

Laqui, however, clarified that they could still accept patients.

National Kidney and Transplant Institute (NKTI) Executive Director Dr. Rose Liquete said they admitted 110 patients in their emergency room, which was more than twice its capacity.

“Punong-puno… hindi na ‘yung bed, ‘yung iba cut-bed na o kaya reclining chair. Actually, ang capacity namin siguro ay ilagay mo na lang sa 40. So sobra-sobra na yun,” Liquete said.

(The beds were full. Sometimes, a patient would use a cut-bed or reclining chair. Maybe our capacity has reached 40. So, that’s too much.)

“But we will maintain the tent… mga tatlong tents… buffer lang naman dapat ito pero napupuno na rin [But we will maintain the tent… around three tents.. this were just buffers but were already full],” she stated, adding that they have also opened their gymnasium to accommodate more patients.

Although NKTI already released an advisory that it would not accept patients due to lack of space and nurses, Liquete said they would still examine them once they came to the hospital.

The DOH on Saturday said that the PGH and Makati Medical Center (MMC) were not currently overwhelmed by admissions of COVID-19 cases.

The MMC had issued a clarification of its carefully managed operations and availability for COVID-19 cases should there be a spike (there is none),” the department said.

“PGH has clarified that being a public service hospital in high demand, it is occupied by mostly non-COVID-19 cases, and is simply advising the public to please coordinate admissions first,” it added. — Mel Matthew Doctor/DVM, GMA News