Like a plane dangerously weighed down by passengers and cargo, Ontario hospitals are running so overloaded patient safety is compromised, experts warn.
While many countries keep hospital bed capacity at 85% or less to manage surges in demand, some Ontario hospitals are operating near or above 100% — a jam that risks patient care and backs up emergency departments.
“You have to have some empty beds to efficiently and safely manage patient flow,” said Dr. James Worthington, a senior vice-president at Ottawa’s civic and general hospitals, which Tuesday were operating at 109% capacity.
“The present system is overly stressed and that increases the risk of adverse events,” he said.
Ottawa isn’t alone in its crunch: University and Victoria hospitals in London averaged 104% and 102% capacity from April to December last year.
Overcrowding concerns are backed by research that finds as hospital occupancy rates rise, so does the rate of infection from superbugs that sometimes kill patients.
“There is strong evidence of an association between high bed occupancy and (the superbug C. difficile),” researchers wrote recently in the journal Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology.
Just why Ontario hospitals are jammed is in dispute. But many point to bed numbers here that are a fraction of what’s found in other countries.
Ontario has 2.4 hospital beds for every 1,000 residents, less than half the European average. Of 39 countries compared by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, only three had fewer hospital beds than Ontario: Mexico, India and Indonesia.
That sort of finding should raise concerns in Ontario, said Dr. Andrew Keegan, a professor at Sydney Medical School who advises the Australian government.
“Considering we have similar populations, (the lack of beds in Ontario) could be the problem,” Keegan said.
Patients waiting in Ontario ERs for hospital beds are likely getting “sub-optimal care,” he said.
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