Due to overload, approximately 500 to 700 patients will have to be brought to intensive care and other departments in hospitals outside the province, Marcel Visser reported on behalf of the Regional Consultation Acute Care Chain (ROAZ) in Brabant in a conversation at the Elisabeth-TweeSteden Hospital in Tilburg.
De capaciteit van de Brabantse ziekenhuizen, waaronder de intensive care, is de komende week onvoldoende. Door overbelasting zullen circa 500 tot 700 patiënten naar de intensive care en andere afdelingen in ziekenhuizen elders moeten worden gebracht.https://t.co/btE34zPuoF
— Het Parool (@parool) March 21, 2020
According to him, this concerns both patients who need intensive care and patients who are less serious. Dutch daily Het Parool reported that the Defense Ministry will be involved in the transfer of patients. On Saturday, approximately 60 patients were already transferred to hospitals elsewhere in the country.
These 60 patients were helped mainly by mutual contacts between hospitals. From now on, the so-called patient repatriation will be conducted from the ROAZ in collaboration with Defense. Currently it concerns only the region of North Brabant, but next week there will be a national coordination point, Visser said.
By repatriating patients from North Brabant, Visser hopes to “level off” the peak in patient numbers. “It may be that small peaks arise elsewhere in the country as a result. Then it can also be the other way around, that patients come from there to Brabant.”
Visser, who himself works on the board of the Jeroen Bosch Hospital in Den Bosch, said the Corona departments throughout the province are currently experiencing problems.