Jeff Wicklander. Image courtesy: Aspirus Health
WAUSAU, WI (WSAU) — Officials with Wausau-based Aspirus Health say they haven’t reached full capacity as the Delta variant of COVID-19 continues to spread in the region, but they are keeping an eye on things.
“We have a large volume of COVID patents and non-COVID patents,” said Jeff Wicklander, Aspirus Senior Vice President and President of the Wausau facility. “We do have the capacity, all of our units are open, and we continue to evaluate the needs at each site. Every morning we have our emergency operations call looking at bed capacity across the region as well as staffing- do we need to redeploy our resources. Overall, we are doing quite well.”
Wicklander says the biggest difference between the most recent surge in COVID-19 infections and previous ones is that more patients are getting seriously ill. “Last year about 25% of those were in the ICU. What we are seeing with this surge is about 50% of the patients who get admitted are in the Intensive Care Unit.”
Additionally, they’re seeing more younger patients. Those who end up in the ICU also tend to have a higher body mass index and are not vaccinated.
Wicklander adds that the system has more capacity for ICU patents thanks to the acquisition of several former Ascension hospitals earlier this year.
He also took questions regarding the upcoming flu season. After seeing a relatively mild season last winter, he says he’s not counting on the same thing happening this year.
“We’re hoping for it, but I don’t think that’s what we will see. We won’t have the restrictions, people staying at home, masking, social distancing,” he said.
That means getting as many flu shots in arms as possible, something his team has been planning for along with the distribution of the COVID-19 boosters. “We are going to make sure as the community comes in for that vaccine that we give them the flu vaccine at that time [as well,] or at least offer it to them.”
Wicklander adds that they plan to offer many walk-in flu vaccine clinics to make those shots easily available as well.
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