Ontario opens COVID-19 field hospital
Facility aims to ease pressure on acute care
An Ontario field hospital built during the start of the pandemic will begin taking patients this week as a worsening wave of COVID-19 infections pushes the health-care system to its limits.
The Burlington, Ont., facility on the grounds of Joseph Brant Hospital was ready to treat patients as of Monday, the hospital said. Hospitals in the region were working Tuesday to identify patients ready for transfer.
The field unit was built in April as part of the hospital network’s capacity plan — one of several to go up across the province during the pandemic.
Hospital CEO Eric Vandewall said it was deemed time to use the 73- bed all- season facility to keep scheduled surgeries and important services running as acutecare units reach their full capacity with COVID-19 patients.
“The ( field unit) is, in a sense, an insurance policy, and one that you hope you never have to use,” Vandewall said in an interview Tuesday.
“We’re very fortunate to have the resource. It’s troubling obviously, that we’re having to use the resource at this time.”
COVID-19 infections have put pressure on hospital capacity across the province, especially in the southern Ontario region that includes Hamilton, Niagara, Haldimand, Brant and Burlington.
“The system is more stretched than it’s ever been before and, unfortunately, all the indicators still are heading in the wrong direction,” Anthony Dale, president of the Ontario Hospital Association, said on Tuesday.
“In some cases, they’re accelerating, so the situation is actually getting much worse.”
Rob Macisaac, president of Hamilton Health Sciences, had said earlier that the health- care system was “being stretched to its limits.”
As of Tuesday, the province said 1,347 people were hospitalized from COVID-19. Of those, 352 were in intensive care and 245 on ventilators.
Hospitals are identifying patients this week whose care has progressed enough to be treated at the Burlington field unit, after consulting with their families.
Those would be cases where the patient’s condition has stabilized but they still require help that wouldn’t be available at home, Vandewall said, like oxygen therapy, help with medication or monitoring of their symptoms.
Staffing has been a challenge during this wave of infections, Vandewall said, but there are currently enough staff for 30 beds, with plans to increase capacity this month if necessary.
Vandewall said the hospital is willing to set aside regional boundaries and accept overflow patients from elsewhere in the province if there is a need.
“Those boundaries no longer are in play,” he said. “We’re certainly here to provide that support, if called upon.”
Meanwhile, a hospital network in London, Ont., said it is storing bodies in a mobile unit after its morgue reached capacity.
The London Health Sciences Centre said new processes due to the pandemic have meant more time is needed to secure arrangements for bodies.
It said that has led to the need for more interim “body holding solutions.”
Chief information officer Glen Kearns said the use of the mobile unit is a temporary measure and one that is being used for the second time since the pandemic began.
He said the hospital network expects its morgue capacity issues to be resolved within days.
THE (FIELD UNIT) IS, IN A SENSE, AN INSURANCE POLICY.