By NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Dr. Rex Degner from Hutchinson Regional Healthcare system sounded a warning about healthcare capacity Thursday night as part of the COVID-Cut Off Town Hall online.
"In order to take care of the community, we can only handle so many COVID patients," Degner said. "As we get more COVID, we are getting to the point where, as of next week, we are going to be limiting certain elective procedures, so that we can free up nursing and other personnel to take care of the COVID patients. We really are reaching critical mass."
Originally, Degner thought they might be able to handle as many as 60 patients in the hospital with COVID. He's changed that opinion.
"We can't handle 60 COVID patients in this hospital," Degner said. "If we did, that would be all we would have in the hospital and everything else would have to be diverted to other communities."
He doesn't mean close communities, necessarily, either.
"That may not be just Wichita," Degner said. "That may be diversion to Kansas City, to Omaha, to somewhere else that could take them. That's for your routine care."
As of Thursday, there were 24 COVID patients at Hutchinson Regional and nine in ICU with five intubated. These are different than the county dashboard numbers because some Reno County residents go to hospitals outside the county and some residents from other counties come to Hutchinson for care.