While West Hawaii has largely been spared in the state’s most recent surge of COVID-19 cases, Kona Community Hospital has been working in the recent weeks and days to prepare for an outbreak.
“We went to ‘orange‘ level on our emergency management plan, which means that on Hawaii Island, there are 50 to 100 active cases,” Kona Community Hospital spokesperson Judy Donovan said on Wednesday. “We expect to go to ‘red’ tomorrow (today). The way the numbers are jumping, we’ll be over 100 tomorrow.”
Part of the jump to red on their emergency management plan includes deploying triage tents and diverting all suspected COVID patients to the hospital’s north wing of the emergency department. The 94-bed facility currently contains 60 total patients, none positive for COVID, as of Wednesday evening. Five of the hospitals nine ICU beds are occupied, while only one of the facility’s 13 ventilators is in use.
Kona Community Hospital’s surge capacity includes approximately 30 beds with the addition of the triage tents, in addition to potentially closing off a separate COVID wing to add as many as 17 negative pressure isolation rooms. These rooms, designed to circulate air outside the building instead of recycling it, are necessary for dealing with infectious diseases like COVID. The hospital already has 16 negative pressure rooms as of Wednesday. If needed, some current ICU rooms also have the ability to be expanded to two-bed rooms.
A recent worry around the state’s hospitals has been a shortage of staff. Donovan maintained this problem isn’t present at Kona Community Hospital.
“We are fully staffed,” Donovan said. “At one point early on, we were a little concerned, so we did pull in the agency staff to put us up to maximum staffing. We’ve been very fortunate at this point. We’re very proud of those guys and gals who are just coming to work every day, and they’re ready for anything that comes up.”
In both the orange and red levels, elective procedures at the hospital have been discontinued. Emergent and urgent surgical procedures are still continuing, as well as outpatient procedures as long as patients have provided a negative COVID test within the previous 72 hours. Visitors are not allowed in the hospital, with exceptions made for support for mothers having a baby, pediatric patients and end-of-life situations.
Concerns over other hospitals on the Big Island and Oahu reaching capacity have been raised, but as of now, there are no plans to move patients to Kona.
“Our infection prevention manager listens in on those phone calls every day,” Donovan said. “Those conversations are happening in Hilo. We sit in on those calls, but we haven’t been factored into it yet.”
Above all, Donovan wants the public to remain vigilant to prevent community spread.
“We’re really focusing here on reminding people to not let their guard down,” Donovan said. “They can help stop the spread by wearing their masks all the time, staying home if they’re sick and social distancing.”