To accommodate increasing severe coronavirus disease (Covid-19) cases, the Quezon City General Hospital and Medical Center (QCGHMC) will convert its chapel into an intensive care unit (ICU) ward.
In a statement on Friday, QCGHMC Director Dr. Josephine Sabando said the hospital’s Covid-19 ward and ICU have reached their full capacity.
“With this extension facility, we hope to admit more Covid-19 patients who are in need of urgent and extensive treatment,” Sabando said.
The chapel will have a 21-bed Covid-19 ICU.
The hospital’s second and third floors serve as quarantine facility with 300 beds.
It also has a four-bed dialysis unit for the asymptomatic to severe Covid-19 patients with confirmed renal disease.
The city government is still procuring more hospital equipment such as patient monitors, high-flow machines, and ventilators.
“Once we positioned the beds and received the machines, we can start assigning doctors and nurses in the extended facility and make it fully operational,” Sabando said.
When the enhanced community quarantine was implemented on Aug. 6, the Outpatient Department (OPD) was used as a temporary quarantine facility for health care workers assigned to the Covid-19 ward.
The OPD is currently on a telephone consultation system, which handles non-urgent cases for assessment and scheduling of face-to-face appointment, if needed.
“We have also reached full capacity sa ating (in our) non-Covid ward and pediatric ward. Despite these, we will still admit urgent cases like trauma cases, vehicular accidents, and acute cases of stroke as well as obstetric cases,” Sabando said.
The city’s 11 Hope community quarantine facilities have a combined 91.11 percent occupancy rate as of Thursday while the Rosario Maclang Bautista General Hospital on Batasan Road and Novaliches District Hospital have exceeded their capacity.
The city’s active Covid-19 cases have climbed to 5,339 as of Friday from 2,502 on July 31.
Source: Philippines News Agency
