TYLER, Texas — CHRISTUS Trinity Mother Frances spent the last year learning about COVID-19. Now, they're using what they've learned to better treat their patients.
"We don't want one patient to not get the care they need no matter where they're from," Jason Proctor, President CHRISTUS Trinity mother Frances Hospital, said.
Due to the rampant Delta variant, more patients than ever are in CHRISTUS hospitals — and they're sicker than the initial surge in January.
Dr. Mark Anderson, Chief Medical Officer for CHRISTUS Trinity Mother Frances Hospital, says this new surge began at the beginning of August.
"The patients are also more critically ill, where nearly 45% of the patients in the hospital are requiring ventilators," Anderson said. "And with that, both number surge and the surging criticality of the patients."
The surge is leading the team to think up new ways to treat patients.
"It's caused us to look at multiple different areas of how we can improve, both the care of the patient and the capacity of the hospital, to deal with these increasing numbers increased severity," Anderson said.
Some changes, Anderson explains, include repurposing parts of their hospital for COVID-19 patients — including converting a waiting room into an extra ICU.
"We literally turned space, conference rooms and waiting rooms into patient care space in 48 hours," Proctor said.
But with the rising surge has come a new low: nurses are leaving the field in record numbers, causing many hospitals, including CHRISTUS, to find new employees.
"We've been recruiting nurses, we brought in contract nurses, we've asked for help from the state through RAC nurses bringing in more critical care, trained nurses, respiratory therapists, other staff, we've spread those skill sets to our educators across multiple nursing units," Anderson said.
It's an unprecedented crisis for East Texas, and for CHRISTUS.
"We had training in weapons of mass destruction and hurricanes and disaster events," Anderson said. "But this is like, a very slow-moving hurricane that we haven't really got hit by the eye wall yet. It's sustainability. So it's a crisis that, you know, communities are experiencing."
CHRISTUS has been part of the East Texas community for a long time, and it's moments like these where they know it's all hands on deck.
"This is our 84th year of being here," Proctor said. "The truth is our community has never needed us more than we have in the last 18 months or so. And that has dictated to us the need and necessity to figure things out."