Tallinn Children's Hospital preparing to treat covid patients
Tallinn Children's Hospital (Tallinna lastehaigla) is preparing to treat coronavirus patients to help alleviate the pressure at the North Estonia Medical Center (PERH) which has reached its capacity limit.
Adult patients will now be treated at the children's hospital, which has seen a decrease in young patients with extraordinary illnesses during the coronavirus pandemic.
Therefore, a situation has arisen where in one hospital nurses have too much work but there is little to do in another, ETV's current affairs show "Aktuaalne kaamera" reported on Wednesday evening. Nurses at the children's hospital will now treat covid patients or be sent to work in other hospitals.
Agris Peedu, head of PERH, said the children's hospital can help by treating patients who need to recover in hospital but do not need to be in intensive care or in active treatement.
The two hospitals are connected by a tunnel and a plan to move patients between wards is being organized.
Peedu said if the number of admitted coronavirus patients keeps growing at the current rate then patients will need to be moved there in the coming weeks. But the head of Tallinn Children's Hospital Katrin Luts thinks the hospital can offer assistance earlier to those who need to recovered post-surgery.
This week PERH will open a new 15-bed covid ward and Peedu said he is anxiously watching the wards fill up.
"The biggest problem for us is still the magic number of 1,000 [admitted patients]. If we say that there are currently about 700 patients all over Estonia, then we can see that hospitals in the southern region still have the capacity to take patients, but if we reach 1,000 across Estonia, hospitals will be in a very, very critical situation," said Peedu.
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Editor: Helen Wright