Macao’s public hospital has expanded the capacity of its emergency department to cope with the massive influx of patients.
The Health Bureau (SS) also called retired nurses back to work, and deployed intern doctors and nurses to assist at various healthcare facilities.
As a result of the pandemic situation in Macao, ambulances are doing more than 400 runs to the emergency wing of the Conde São Januário Hospital every day, while the number of patients in need of hospitalisation continues to increase, according to the SS.
TDM said that the number of people who resort to emergencies has recently quadrupled to 1,200 daily.
The SS indicated that non-urgent or non-essential medical services were suspended at the hospital so that medical resources could be used to treat severe cases of Covid-19.
Around 80 medical specialists from across the different services are in charge of the hospital’s isolation wards and another 60 resident doctors and doctors from the city health centres have been sent to the Emergency Services and the Community Treatment Centre in Taipa to participate in the triage of patients.
More isolation wards have been created, boosting the number of available beds from 300 to 700.
The SS also said that vaccination work at the public hospital has been suspended and the 24-hour external consultation area has been transformed into a transition area for emergency patients, where 40 temporary beds are available.
In the meantime, a new coordination group including resources from the Red Cross, the Transport Bureau, the Public Security Police Force and the Fire Brigade is supporting the transport of patients to the appropriate treatment facilities, nursing homes or residences.
About 30 percent of public hospital medical staff have already tested positive for Covid-19, while the Kiang Wu private hospital revealed on Monday that about 40 per cent of workers in the medical sector are infected.
Kiang Wu is treating around 800 patients a day while also suspending all non-urgent activities in order to concentrate human resources on patients with Covid-19.
According to the Novel Coronavirus Response and Coordination Centre, the Conde de São Januário Hospital Centre’s “medical outreach team” provided treatment to residents of the city’s 37 care homes for senior citizens and rehabilitation homes via about 1,660 face-to-face and telephone consultations, with 50 follow-up visits.
The outreach team, led by a geriatrician and other types of specialists, provides 24-hour medical assessment and treatment services. When a Covid-19 infection case occurs in a care home, the Centre added, staff members of the care home can call to consult the doctor on duty.
Depending on each patient’s conditions, the doctor will instruct the care home to send him or her to the hospital or to isolate them for treatment in situ. Afterward, doctors will go to the care home to make a diagnosis, provide treatments and prescribe the medicines needed for the patient, so as to reduce the service users’ inconvenience of having to leave their care home for medical purposes.
