Ars Technica: Patient dies after ransomware attack reroutes her to remote hospital. “A woman seeking emergency treatment for a life-threatening condition died after a ransomware attack crippled a nearby hospital in Duesseldorf, Germany, and forced her to obtain services from a more distant facility, it was widely reported on Thursday.”
hospitals
New York Times: Billions in Hospital Virus Aid Rested on Compliance With Private Vendor
New York Times: Billions in Hospital Virus Aid Rested on Compliance With Private Vendor. “The Trump administration tied billions of dollars in badly needed coronavirus medical funding this spring to hospitals’ cooperation with a private vendor collecting data for a new Covid-19 database that bypassed the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The highly unusual demand, aimed at hospitals in coronavirus hot spots using funds passed by Congress with no preconditions, alarmed some hospital administrators and even some federal health officials.”
Axios: Hospitals still suing patients in coronavirus hotspots
Axios: Hospitals still suing patients in coronavirus hotspots. “Almost all of the roughly two dozen Community Health Systems hospitals in Florida, Texas and Arizona have sued patients since the pandemic began. Many paused or slowed down in the spring, but then resumed business as usual over the summer — when these states were being hit hardest.”
The home front: Virus stalks nurses after they leave work (Associated Press)
Associated Press: The home front: Virus stalks nurses after they leave work. “There’s red tape running along the floor of the coronavirus unit at St. Jude’s Medical Center in Fullerton, California. It’s a clear line of demarcation. On one side, the cold zone, where only a surgical mask, scrubs and shoe coverings are necessary. On the other, the warm zone, where the gloves come on. And the N95 mask. And the gown. And the hairnet. And the face shield. Another step through glass doors and it’s into the hot zone, where coughing patients in green-patterned gowns await. It’s outside this unit, in an area not marked by red tape or glass doors, that worries the nurses of ‘4 North’ most.”
Boston Globe: In calm before the storm, hospitals prepare for second wave of COVID-19
Boston Globe: In calm before the storm, hospitals prepare for second wave of COVID-19. “In the spring, hospitals cobbled together the space and staff to care for hundreds of severely ill patients — in many cases more than ever before seen — and the lessons on how to do that will guide the response to whatever the fall brings. Advances in understanding how to treat the illness might lead to shorter lengths of stay or fewer admissions. And improved testing capacity means hospitals are no longer in the dark about how many patients might show up at their doorstep. But hospital officials also foresee new challenges that weren’t encountered in the spring.”
“Zuck off”: Doctors, nurses, scientists rail against Zuckerberg (Ars Technica)
Ars Technica: “Zuck off”: Doctors, nurses, scientists rail against Zuckerberg. “San Francisco city officials are considering condemning the decision to name a local public hospital after Mark Zuckerberg—a move backed by nurses and doctors at the hospital, who have been railing against the Facebook co-founder and CEO since the hospital changed its name in 2015.”
Atlanta Journal-Constitution: New COVID-19 cases push hospitals to capacity
Atlanta Journal-Constitution: New COVID-19 cases push hospitals to capacity. “After weeks of an eerie silence, some hospitals in Savannah are now jammed with patients. On a recent day, several ambulances packed the hospital bays outside one hospital’s emergency room, as an unusual number of paramedics waited in the hallway with their patients in cots, ready to drop them off. But there were no beds to receive them, and crews can’t leave until patients are admitted. That can take hours, said Chuck Kearns, chief of Chatham County EMS, the region’s 911 provider.”
CBS News: Some ICUs in Florida have run out of beds
CBS News: Some ICUs in Florida have run out of beds. “At least 45 hospitals in Florida had no available beds in intensive care units as of Sunday afternoon as the state has emerged as the new epicenter of the U.S. coronavirus pandemic, according to data from the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration. Nine of those facilities are located in hard-hit Miami-Dade County and another five are in neighboring Broward County.”
US Department of Health & Human Services: HHS To Begin Distributing $10 Billion in Additional Funding to Hospitals in High Impact COVID-19 Areas
US Department of Health & Human Services: HHS To Begin Distributing $10 Billion in Additional Funding to Hospitals in High Impact COVID-19 Areas. “… the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), is announcing it will begin distributing $10 billion in a second round of high impact COVID-19 area funding to hospitals starting [this] week. As parts of the nation confront a recent surge in positive COVID-19 cases and hospitals elsewhere continue to recover and grapple with the financial hardships caused by the pandemic, HHS recognizes the need to quickly get these funds to frontline health care providers.”
‘All the hospitals are full’: In Houston, overwhelmed ICUs leave COVID-19 patients waiting in ER (NBC News)
NBC News: ‘All the hospitals are full’: In Houston, overwhelmed ICUs leave COVID-19 patients waiting in ER. “Houston hospitals have been forced to treat hundreds of COVID-19 patients in their emergency rooms — sometimes for several hours or multiple days — as they scramble to open additional intensive care beds for the wave of seriously ill people streaming through their doors, according to internal numbers shared with NBC News and ProPublica. At the same time, the region’s 12 busiest hospitals are increasingly telling emergency responders that they cannot safely accept new patients, at a rate nearly three times that of a year ago, according to data reviewed by reporters.”
Data breakthrough: nearly 7,000 Floridians hospitalized with COVID-19, 112 in Brevard (Florida Today)
Florida Today: Data breakthrough: nearly 7,000 Floridians hospitalized with COVID-19, 112 in Brevard. “There are 6,991 COVID-19 patients across Florida’s hospitals, 112 of whom are in Brevard County. After weeks of pressure, Florida on Friday began publishing current, rather than cumulative, hospitalization statistics for coronavirus patients.”
Montgomery Advertiser: Available Alabama ICU beds at all-time low as COVID-19 hospitalizations spike
Montgomery Advertiser: Available Alabama ICU beds at all-time low as COVID-19 hospitalizations spike. “A steep spike in coronavirus hospitalizations across Alabama has led to ‘serious strain’ on hospital capacity across the state, with 206 ICU beds available in state hospitals as of Wednesday afternoon. Dr. Don Williamson, president of the Alabama Hospital Association, said ICUs around the state are 88% full.”
Reuters: Dozens of Florida hospitals out of available ICU beds, state data shows
Reuters: Dozens of Florida hospitals out of available ICU beds, state data shows. “More than four dozen hospitals in Florida reported that their intensive care units (ICUs) have reached full capacity on Tuesday as COVID-19 cases surge in the state and throughout the country. Hospital ICUs were full at 54 hospitals across 25 of Florida’s 67 counties, according to data published on Tuesday morning by the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration. More than 300 hospitals were included in the report, but not all had adult ICUs.”
Newsweek: 4 Hospitals in Fla. County Run Out of ICU Beds as State Sets Another Record in New Daily COVID Cases
Newsweek: 4 Hospitals in Fla. County Run Out of ICU Beds as State Sets Another Record in New Daily COVID Cases. “All intensive care unit (ICU) beds are currently occupied at four hospitals in Pinellas County, Florida, as the state continues to see a record spike in new cases and hospitalizations related to the novel coronavirus.”
Slate: How Florida Hospitals Are Handling the Coronavirus Surge
Slate: How Florida Hospitals Are Handling the Coronavirus Surge. “While the pandemic has been described as a matter of waves, Florida never saw an end to its first: it has only experienced a growth in cases since March. The scenario health experts warned of appears to have finally caught up with the state, including a significant spike in mid-June, a week or so after it began its second phase of reopening. Slate spoke with Dr. Minal Ahson, a University of South Florida Health Med-Peds Hospitalist in Tampa, about what this surge in cases looks like on the ground and how it hits differently four months into the pandemic. This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.”
