Henry Ford Health System: “We Are in Crisis”

(December 15, 2021 5:07 PM) Leaders of Henry Ford Health System termed the current state of COVID a crisis as the health system is now treating 500 COVID patients, a 34 percent increase in just the past month.  As Henry Ford approaches the one-year anniversary of administering its first COVID-19 vaccinations, senior leaders offered a grim assessment today of how surging hospitalizations have their hospitals on the brink.

Statewide, hospitalizations are up 10 percent and deaths are up 79 percent in the past two weeks.  Today, Michigan’s fourth COVID-19 surge hit a new milestone:  the average number of people dying of the disease each day over a seven-day period hit 100 for the first time in a year.  This is the highest daily death toll the state has seen since the second wave during December 2020.

Bob Riney,  Henry Ford’s President of Healthcare Operations and Chief Operating Officer, and Adnan Munkarah, M.D., Executive Vice President and Chief Clinical Officer, described the situation as dire, a crisis caused by people sick with COVID who are unvaccinated.

“The unfortunate reality right now is that no matter which hospital you’re talking to, no matter which health system you’re talking to, the word that you’re going to hear about current conditions in the state of Michigan is crisis,” Riney said. “We are in crisis. There’s no way around it. There’s no way to sugarcoat it. On any given day, our emergency departments are either at capacity or close to it, and often times serving as inpatient units because we don’t have beds available in our standard inpatient units or ICUs.

“Our worry is that as we gather for the holidays and we’re all exhausted with the protective measures, we totally understand that, that things could even get worse.”

With its hospitals running at close to 100 percent for months, Riney said they aren’t built to operate at that level for weeks on end. Optimally, hospitals operate at 85 percent capacity to allow for overflow situations.

Dr. Munkarah said 80 percent of patients hospitalized with COVID are unvaccinated and 85 percent of COVID patients in the intensive care unit are unvaccinated.  “People who are vaccinated are 30 times more likely to survive a COVID admission than unvaccinated patients,” Dr. Munkarah said, and “the unvaccinated people continue to make up the majority of admissions.”

At Henry Ford Allegiance Health in Jackson, the hospital is treating a record 85 patients with COVID-19, the vast majority are unvaccinated.  Last week, HFAH had to suspend all non-urgent procedures and non time-sensitive surgeries for a day because the hospital is overwhelmed with COVID cases.  Riney said it is possible this will happen again.  “We are looking at every case, evaluating several times a day our capacity to handle non urgent situations,” Riney said.  The hospital is moving some procedures and surgeries to ambulatory settings and surgical centers.  

This Friday will mark the one-year anniversary of Henry Ford starting to administer vaccinations and Dr. Munkarah said the situation is worse today than a year ago.

Also in the briefing, Jacqueline Pflaum-Carlson, M.D., a critical care and emergency medicine physician at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit, said the overwhelmingly number of COVID patients have taken its toll on her and her colleagues.

“With each passing day and each increased patient load and each death, it gets harder and harder to maintain that positive attitude,” she said, adding a personal plea to the unvaccinated to get their shot.

“Things are hard and we’re doing everything we can and doing our best to keep patients in good care. Have a little grace and consideration in how devastating things are right now.”

She said it has been tragic that so many patients have been led astray by vaccine misinformation.

“It’s so heartbreaking to walk them down this path of death, knowing this was preventable. And watching their family members have to go through this,” Dr. Pflaum-Carlson said.

 The economic toll of the pandemic is also a crisis, Riney said.  “We have record burnout (among staff), accelerated resignations and we are bringing in crisis labor.  We will be footing this bill every month that this continues”.

Despite Emergency Departments at all hospitals at capacity, Riney stressed the importance of those with emergencies to come to the E.D.  One of the strains on the Emergency Department is the large number of people coming in to be tested for COVID.  “We do not offer testing in the Emergency Room,” said Riney.  There are other places:   pharmacies, urgent care centers, primary practices and other locations that offer testing.