A contingency plan has been developed with medical personnel to attend to the increase in patients.
Since the last days of December 2021 and the first days of this year, there has been an accelerated increase in patients with symptoms related to COVID-19 in the hospital of the Ecuadorian Social Security Institute (IESS) in Machala, where more than 500 were treated people between Sunday and Monday, their managers explained.
“Demand was high since December and during the first days of this year there are more people seeking care, we have developed a contingency plan with medical and logistics personnel to coordinate actions and be able to serve all users,” said the Dr. Richard Chiriboga, medical director of the IESS Machala hospital.
Patients must undergo triage before having a PCR or swab test; For this reason, from the early hours of the morning of this Monday, long columns of patients were formed seeking care in the tents that were installed as soon as the pandemic began outside this health home.
Chiriboga considers that the increase reaches 38% of patients who come for the tests. The beds in the hospitalization area for those infected with COVID are occupied by 70%, that is, of the 15 beds available, 10 are with seriously ill patients. And of the 12 beds available in Zone 0, 8 are occupied.
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In November, 375 PCR tests were performed at the IESS hospital, of which 99 were positive. On the other hand, 604 were carried out in December and 383 yielded a positive result, which shows an increase of 285% between the last two months of 2021.
“We have had cases of entire families that have been infected, the maximum peak of infected we had was the last week of December. Some of these cases could also be related to the November holiday (Day of the Dead and Cuenca independence) ”, added the doctor.
“My wife has the flu and we want to rule out that she has the virus, we have not met with family and friends on these holidays, we have only been at home, so we hope it is just a normal flu, typical of this winter season,” he said Wilson Carrión, one of the patients who came seeking care. (I)
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