2023-12-28 18:01:00
the essentials Lack of beds, gastro epidemic, first cases of flu and winter illnesses, the emergency rooms in Cahors are in tight flow during the Christmas holidays and this should not improve in the coming weeks.
At the SAMU control center in Cahors, the calls follow one another and might almost be similar. Medical dispatch assistants who receive calls and doctors are on deck. On Wednesday, they had no less than 260 calls, instead of 150 to 180 normally. “One in two calls concerns an episode of gastro. The epidemic is quite significant this year. We have 5 to 10% more calls this week with patients who are also looking for doctors on call since many general practitioners are on call. leave” explains Doctor Thierry Debreux, head of the SAMU/Emergency Unit at the Cahors Hospital Center.
A lack of beds
In addition to gastro, with the cold of recent weeks, winter illnesses are here and the first cases of flu are knocking at the emergency room doors. At reception, it is displayed that there is a minimum wait of 3 hours. “Elderly people are very quickly weakened by severe gastro. On top of that, we have had a lot of heart pathologies, heart attacks, or even pulmonary edema, a little more than normal.” underlines emergency doctor Ducminh Tran. Result: activity is much more sustained in the emergency room than usual with 74 visits per day on average, tension is felt in terms of the lack of beds.
Thursday morning, a crisis unit was set up to call on all services to find beds. “In the emergency room, beds become available during the day, patients go upstairs in the various departments concerned, but if there are none, it is tense. We find them all over the place, at the day by day” says Thierry Debreux. Doctors, nursing staff and administration work hand in hand to find solutions adapted to each patient. “We can discharge patients earlier, once at home, we follow up by telephone. It’s difficult to anticipate, tomorrow it might be the opposite” continues Doctor Tran.
Avoid excesses during the holidays
But the doctors put things into perspective and recognize that they work in good conditions, far from extreme cases like in the emergency rooms of Strasbourg where to cope with the influx of patients, the university hospitals (HUS) deployed a mobile unit on Friday December 22 in the morning. outside in the parking lot. “In some hospitals it’s like this every day, every day tense and a headache to place patients. We will say that the lights are orange at the moment, but each patient is taken care of in good conditions” insists Thierry Debreux.
So so that everyone has a good holiday, including emergencies, Lotois are advised to remain cautious, to avoid excesses of all kinds, not to come to the emergency room when it is a pathology that can be treated by a general practitioner. There is also the care center at number 3966 where an on-call doctor can answer various questions and direct patients to on-call practices or send someone there.
1703788096
#Gastro #epidemic #winter #illnesses #Cahors #emergencies #pressure #holidays
