Queen’s West declares emergency amid bed shortage

The Queen’s Health Systems on Monday once again declared an “internal state of emergency” for its West Oahu hospital as the rate of admissions there outpaced the number of available beds amid Hawaii’s omicron surge.

The declaration for The Queen’s Medical Center-­West Oahu sets certain response procedures in motion, according to Chief Operating Officer Jason Chang, to give the hospital’s emergency department time to relieve pressures, such as the transfer of higher-acuity patients to The Queen’s Medical Center downtown.

As of 3 p.m. Monday, Chang said, QMC-West, which has 104 beds, was at 112% inpatient occupancy, with 58 patients in the emergency department and 16 inpatients waiting for a bed upstairs.

About 25 of those patients are COVID-19 patients, according to Queen’s.

At the same time, 96 health care providers at QMC-West are out due to exposure to COVID-19, and that is providing additional challenges, according to Chang. QMC-West, however, is not shut down, and area residents should still go to the hospital if they have an emergency.

“The safety and well-being of our patients and staff remain our highest priority,” said Chang in a statement.

Queen’s also declared an internal state of emergency for Queen’s-West in late August, during the height of the delta surge.

On Monday the state Department of Health reported 3,875 new coronavirus infections, bringing the state’s total since the start of the pandemic to 147,099 cases.

The seven-day average of new cases statewide climbed to a high of 3,439, while the average positivity rate was at a record high of 20.6%, meaning at least 1 out of every 5 people tested in Hawaii is testing positive for COVID-19.

Gov. David Ige said Monday during an interview on the Honolulu Star-Advertiser’s “Spotlight Hawaii” livestream program that the state was still awaiting approval of Federal Emergency Management Agency funding for more than 900 relief personnel from the mainland to help care for COVID-19 patients in Hawaii.

Although Ige said he was concerned about the increasing case counts, he announced no new measures to help curb rising coronavirus infections.

“We are carefully watching the health care system and hospital counts, and it has been steadily increasing,” he said. “The one area that has had a slow increase is really in the ICU units with COVID patients. We had heard that omicron might not be as virulent as delta or previous COVID cases, and certainly that’s something that we are looking at.”

On Monday the state’s Hawaii Emergency Management Agency reported at 1 p.m. that 328 patients with the coronavirus were in Hawaii hospitals, with 32 in intensive care units and 12 on ventilators.

At 4:30 p.m. Monday, HI-EMA revised those numbers down to 312, with 31 in intensive care and 13 on ventilators, due to a correction submitted by one of the hospitals.

“We are looking at the number of COVID patients in the ICUs,” Ige said. “That really is an indication of severe illness, and with omicron we’re seeing less COVID patients in our ICU units even though that is increasing very, very slowly.”

Queen’s, meanwhile, announced it has converted its Island Urgent Care in Kakaako to a dedicated COVID-19 testing site in response to increased demand and that it will keep extended hours in place at its Blaisdell Center vaccination clinic.

The clinic in the center’s Pikake Room will be open from 7:30 a.m. to 8 p.m. daily except Sundays and Tuesdays. Vaccinations are available by appointment or on a walk-in basis.

As of Monday, 24.8% of the state’s population had completed COVID-19 vaccinations, with about 28% boosted. No new deaths were reported Monday, and Hawaii’s COVID-19 death toll remained at 1,105.