The FBI also apologizes for sending fewer than expected vaccine doses.
(Rick Egan | Photo gallery file) Taylor Woodrow tests on Covid-19 at Intermountain Healthcare Cottonwood InstaCare on Friday, December 11, 2020.
Intensive care units at Utah hospitals have never been slammed like this during the pandemic – and many of them are not yet officially full – when the state reported another 2,408 cases of COVID-19 and eight more deaths on Saturday.
The percentage of all ICU beds occupied statewide is now 99.4%, or 534 of 537 beds filled.
At the 14 largest hospitals treating the most coronavirus cases, the percentage of IC beds is now occupied at 104.1%, or 480 patients, exceeding their official capacity of 461 beds.
With COVID-19 on top of regular cases, the University of Utah Health’s ICs reached a point earlier this week where “ we couldn’t admit anyone, and it took several hours ” for the beds to open, as some patients left or were transferred, said Dr. Kencee Graves, assistant chief physician there.
That happened despite the fact that earlier this year – as the coronavirus threat grew – the university converted part of the space into a new ICU with a 23-bed ‘surgical unit’ outside of the normal 111 ICU places.
On Saturday, Graves said the university was officially 115% of its normal capacity and occupied all of its usual 111 beds and many in the peak ward.
It faces many challenges in addition to having beds, Graves said.
“You need the physical bed, a safe space for the bed, and the staff to take care of the person in bed,” she said. “And so we had to do all those things.”
That means asking ICU nurses and doctors to work two to four extra shifts a month, “many of them at night,” she said.
More IC teams have been formed by moving doctors and nurses from elsewhere and taking residents away from some of their normal rotations. Some surgeries have been delayed, she said, because patients need an IC bed.
Hospitals in Utah are also collaborating, Graves said, so that if one ICU is full, patients can be sent to another with space. Graves said that because the University Hospital also serves people from all over the Intermountain West, it also carefully monitors transfers to make sure they have the extra care available here and that it can be provided.
“We still have a lot of really sick patients there. So we have a lot of deaths, ”said Graves. But she said a good sign is that the number of positive test results has started to decline lately. Fewer cases now means fewer hospitalizations and people in ICU later.
Dr. Eddie Stenehjem, an infectious disease physician at Intermountain Healthcare, also told reporters during a video conference Friday that once COVID-19 patients enter an ICU, “it’s usually not a short hospital stay.”
He said: “Often the average stay is between 10 and 11 days. So it takes a while before those patients are either healthy enough to then leave the ICU – or unfortunately die. “
The state reported on Saturday that 559 people are currently hospitalized with COVID-19. The total number of hospital admissions from the start of the outbreak is now 9,968.
The Chief of Operation Warp Speed, General Gustave F. Perna, said some problems were the result of the federal government’s misjudgment of the number of doses of Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine that could be shipped.
“It was my fault,” he said. “It was a planning mistake, and I am responsible.”
Utah will receive 16,575 doses next week “instead of the 23,400 we planned,” health officials tweeted Friday – a reduction of about 30%.
The health department reported Saturday that 3,648 people received the vaccine in Utah, but said that number could be delayed by a few days.
In a statement Friday, Intermountain Healthcare – which has administered the vaccine to primary care health workers in several of its hospitals – said it “is grateful for what we received and excited that we have begun to vaccinate our healthcare providers. We will adapt as we have the whole pandemic and will administer the vaccine as soon as we get it. “
Likewise, University of Utah Health officials said they were “currently in the process of vaccinating our teams with the supplies we now have in house. We adjust our rollout plan as necessary. “
Both Intermountain and the University of Utah Health urged Utahns to continue to wear face masks, practice social detachment, wash hands, and stay home when sick.
The rate in Utah in the past seven days was 80 infections per 100,000 residents, significantly higher than the national average of 67 per 100,000.
The eight deaths reported Saturday included:
• Five Salt Lake County residents — two men, one 46-64 and the other 65-84; three women, one 46-64 and two 65-84
• A Box Elder County man, aged 65-84.
• A Utah County man over 85 years old.
• A Davis County woman, aged 45-64.
The total death toll from the coronavirus in Utah was 1,148 on Saturday.
The seven-day moving average for positive tests is 2,454 per day. The seven-day moving average for the percentage of positive lab tests is 22.1%, which was stable on Saturday.