COVID-19 related hospitalizations have continued their slow increase in San Diego County and at least one local hospital system has run out of room for patients as the number of flu cases remain high.
"The reality is we have more patients needing beds than we have beds," said UC San Diego Health's Chief Medical Officer Dr. Chris Longhurst.
Longhurst said they are making new patient care units in non-traditional spaces, like conference rooms. That process involves the county of San Diego and state officials. He said some patients admitted to the hospital have to wait up to 24 hours in the hallways of emergency departments for beds to become available.
"It’s interesting we never hit this point during the COVID pandemic the last couple years — even though we had large surges of respiratory patients," Longhurst said. "Now it seems to be the combination of delayed care, along with the tridemic or tripledemic of COVID, the flu and other respiratory viruses like RSV (respiratory syncytial virus)."
Spokespersons from other local health systems including Sharp HealthCare, Kaiser Permanente San Diego and Scripps Health said they are not at the point of having to convert non-traditional spaces for patients. Longhurst said despite being stretched, they are managing and have set up overflow tents. He points out that UCSD has two hospital campuses in their system, while others have more.
"Several of our competitors have five hospital systems — that gives them more ability to load balance between hospitals," Longhurst said. He also added UCSD Health provides specialized care that is not available elsewhere, which also drives patient volume.
According to state data, countywide COVID-related hospitalizations continue to slowly increase, now at 376 people. That number is a little higher than this time last year (354 on Dec. 13, 2021).
"To me it’s really no surprise because we knew once people get together for Thanksgiving, we’re going to see an increase," said Dr. William Tseng, assistant area medical director for Kaiser Permanente San Diego.
Tseng said they too are seeing upticks in COVID-19 and flu hospitalizations and it is unclear how high they could climb.
"Right now we’re on the upslope and we’re hoping if people get vaccinated we can make that mountain into a little hill," he said.
Last winter the number of San Diegans with COVID-19 in hospitals peaked at 1,309 people.
"We are nowhere near the number of cases and admissions as last year — but again this is very early," Tseng said. "We still haven’t hit Christmas yet — we haven’t hit New Years yet."
Tseng encourages people to reduce their risk of being hospitalized for either the flu or COVID-19 by staying up to date on vaccinations. He said people need to protect themselves and others this holiday season.
"You know what to do — I think you’ve got enough information," he said looking directly into the camera. "Try to stay outdoors, protect your environment and mask up if you’re high risk."
Latest numbers show the amount of COVID-19 in San Diegans wastewater has been sharply increasing. Officials said with all the at home testing, which does not make it into official case counts, wastewater is a good indicator of how much virus is in the community.
At Rady Children's Hospital, numbers show a continued decline in RSV cases among kids. A spokesperson for the children's hospital said from Nov. 28 through Dec. 4 they saw 129 cases of RSV, which dropped to 83 from Dec. 5 through Dec. 11.
"So to me it’s not a tripledemic anymore," Tseng said. "It’s a twindemic."
