There may be only one local resident in the Chatham-Kent Health Alliance recovering from COVID, but he or she is not alone; and more out-of-town patients could soon be on the way.
The CKHA accepted its first patient transfer from the Greater Toronto Area to help ease critical care pressure on the wider health care system.
According to a post on social media from Don MacLellan, head of Chatham-Kent EMS, local paramedics conducted their first inter-facility transfer Monday night, from Trillium Health Partners Hospital in Mississauga to CKHA.
Hospital officials said the transferred patient is not in the ICU or on a respirator.
There is one Chatham-Kent resident in hospital here recovering from COVID-19, and one non-resident. Hospital officials declined to divulge where the other COVID-19 patient is from.
“We are prepared to accept any patient transfer, COVID or otherwise,” Fannie Vavoulis, director of communications for the CKHA, said.
Hospitals across the province continue to rely on the leadership of the Provincial Critical Care Command Table and the practice of transferring patients out of hotspot regions in response to all-time high COVID-19 hospitalizations and Intensive Care Unit (ICU) admissions.
“It is our duty and moral obligation to help our neighbours during this difficult time,” said Lori Marshall, president and CEO, CKHA, in a media release. “I’m proud of our staff and physicians at CKHA for their dedication to saving lives across our province.”
CKHA’s ICU occupancy sits at 50 per cent capacity (five of 10 beds are occupied). As mentioned, two people have COVID-19.
Based on direction from the province, hospital officials said CKHA continues to ramp down non-urgent, elective/scheduled care and procedures to accept patient transfers from other regions
Like all hospitals across Ontario, beds at CKHA are provincial assets, funded by the Ontario government.
