Covid-19: Hospital pressures mount as ICU numbers increase

There has been a "significantly increased demand" for intensive care beds due to Covid-19 in Northern Ireland over the weekend, the chief nursing officer has said.

Charlotte McArdle said a surge in demand for services had come more quickly than was expected.

The Belfast Health Trust has outlined plans to open more intensive care beds for Covid patients.

It comes as two healthcare trusts issued an urgent appeal for staff.

Meanwhile, the Belfast Trust tweeted on Monday night that the emergency department at the Children's Hospital was "extremely busy" and "there may be a wait for anyone not in urgent need".

The Belfast Trust is planning to "open a pod of six beds" at Belfast City Hospital, according to the Department of Health, "in addition to the seven non-Covid ICU beds available for complex surgery there".

"This will be dependent on being able to source appropriately skilled staff," a statement read.

"The decision to open a regional nightingale facility has not been made at this time but remains under constant consideration."

Ms McArdle said there had been "increased demand for intensive care beds quite significantly over the weekend".

Northern Ireland's chief nursing officer also said a total of 15 patients were admitted to intensive care units with Covid over the weekend, and that 29 people were in ICUs as of Sunday.

"That was on top of a number that was steadily increasing over the last two weeks," Ms McArdle said.

The peak of second wave of Covid-19 in January saw almost almost 1,000 patients being treated for the illness in hospitals in Northern Ireland and 71 being treated in intensive care.

The latest information from the Department of Health's Covid-19 dashboard shows that there are at least 163 people being treated in hospital for coronavirus.

Ms McArdle also said hospitals were seeing "an increase in young people requiring a very high level of acute care".

"I'm hearing reports that there is a higher number of young people requiring hospital admission, and many of them are requiring respiratory support."

It comes with Northern Ireland's health trusts reporting staff shortages and issuing calls for extra workers.

The Irish News has reported that isolation figures among the Belfast Trust were up by more than 150% in a week.

The current surge in cases and admissions was ahead of the schedule that had been anticipated by healthcare professionals, according to Rita Devlin, acting director of the Royal College of Nursing in Northern Ireland.

"I think people were planning for September and we now see we are at the end of July and we seem to be right in the middle of another wave again," she said.

"The pressure of that is unbelievable on the staff.

"We know our staff are being asked to open extra beds even though there's not the staff to look after the patients in the beds."

However a doctors' trade body has said double-vaccinated healthcare staff should not be exempted from isolating in a bid to tackle staff shortages.

Dr Alan Stout, from the British Medical Association in Northern Ireland, said getting "infection numbers down" was more useful than isolation exemptions.

"At the moment, we have to balance the risk," he said.

"If we have a lot of healthcare workers and just a lot of people in general who aren't actually isolating after contact, we know from infection numbers we have at the moment, it spreads really, really quickly - and a healthcare environment is actually one of the biggest and most important places for spread of infection," he told Good Morning Ulster.

"So I would still urge an awful lot of caution, this is simply the realty of high infection numbers at the moment.

"The answer to this is not to try and compromise on safety and on infection control, the answer to this is get our infection numbers down."

Two Northern Ireland health trusts appealed on social media for off-duty staff to come to work on Sunday evening and overnight due to hospital pressures.

The Belfast and South Eastern trusts said they were under "extreme pressure" due to a rapid increase in patients with Covid-19.

The South Eastern Trust said it had significant staff shortages due to the need for staff to self-isolate.

A spokesperson for the Department of Health said some surgical procedures may be cancelled due to the "surge in demand".

In a statement, the Belfast Trust said pressures had arisen due to an intake of Covid-19 patients "in excess of predictions".

Health Minister Robin Swann tweeted to say the trust did not make such requests of its staff "easily".

"Unfortunately it is necessary as we continue to maintain the services that are expected," he said.