With the current population as it is, hospitals are already hard
put to room patients. What will happen, when we reach 6
million?
They can acknowledge that this is due to a higher than normal cases
of infectious deseases, but hwy do you think this is so? Take a
look at how crowded our MRT is during peak hours, and you can have
a good idea what is causing a higher cases of infections....
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Hospitals running out of room
By Tan Hui Leng, TODAY | Posted: 18 May 2007 0758
hrs
SINGAPORE: A spike in infectious disease cases and other factors
have pushed occupancy rates up at hospitals here resulting in
patients in C- and B2-class wards engaged in a game of musical
chairs or, in this case, beds.
From putting orthopaedic patients in psychiatric wards, to giving
C-class patients free upgrades, the healthcare institutions are
trying more than ever to cope with the burgeoning patient
load.
The National University Hospital (NUH), for one, is "filled to the
brim", one doctor told TODAY. "We have been told to hold off
elective day surgeries and every day, we're urged to discharge
patients quickly if they are fit enough to go home," he said.
The NUH said occupancy rates had hit 90 to 95 per cent in the last
three weeks. Singapore General Hospital has seen 89- to 97-per-cent
bed occupancy over the past two weeks.
Tan Tock Seng Hospital (TTSH), meanwhile, has hovered at between
88- and 93-per-cent occupancy this year. The hospital's former
chief operating officer Christopher Tay explained: "At every
hospital, there is a trigger point for bed occupancy which averages
80 per cent across different departments.
"When these points are hit, the bed management units at hospitals
will tell doctors to 'actively discharge' patients."
However, doctors would only persuade patients who are truly fit
enough to go home, assured Mr Tay.
"Many patients are actually fit to go home but remain due to social
reasons such as not having a carer at home. If the trigger point
has not been met, doctors usually give such patients the benefit of
the doubt. But if they occupy a bed when a patient who is truly ill
needs it, then they need to be persuaded to be discharged."
With the heavily subsidised C-class wards often full, incoming
patients have to be directed to wards for other specialities or
upgraded to higher-class wards. But they continue to enjoy the
80-per-cent subsidy on their ward charges.
While hospitals can just about cope with the normal overflow, the
situation is compounded seasonally. Currently, the virus du jour is
the flu, with upper respiratory tract infections at polyclinics up
40 per cent last week over the same period last year.
Also in the air are dengue fever, chicken pox, and hand, foot and
mouth disease, with a spike in cases. So it is no surprise if, in
general, the 65-per-cent subsidised B2 class wards are full as
well, said Mr Tay.
"It's very busy, there just seems to be many more sick people
around," a Changi General Hospital doctor told Today.
The usually calm 775-bed hospital in Simei has had patients fill
beds in wards not designated for their conditions, as public
hospitals only transfer patients to another hospital as a last
resort.
As C-class wards are perpetually in high demand, no adequate
solution seems to be in sight, even as the unpopular move that is
means-testing has been mooted. And simply increasing the number of
such beds may not be the good idea it seems.
Said Mr Tay: "We put in an extra C-class ward when I was at TTSH
and it was quickly filled up; it's a bottomless pit."
- TODAY/so
