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If you have an emergency, don’t avoid the ER, hospital CEO says

Dominic Giroux said the emergency department is ‘open and safe’
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Health Sciences North CEO Dominic Giroux wants you to know that if you have an emergency, you shouldn't avoid the hospital emergency department over COVID-19 fears.

“Our emergency department is open, and a safe environment to receive emergency care,” Giroux said April 6 during a livestream press conference hosted by the City of Greater Sudbury.

During the press conference, Giroux provided an update on what’s happening at the hospital in terms of creating capacity to manage a potential surge in COVID-19 cases.

At the COVID-19 testing centre at Health Sciences North Research Institute on Walford Road, 2,009 COVID-19 phone assessments have been done, and 652 swabs. 

Of those swabs, 72 were on medical staff or a hospital employee; 55 of the tests came out negative and 17 are pending.

The hospital is “as ready as we can be” for a coming surge in COVID-19 cases, Giroux said. There are only 310 admitted patients (down from 529 last month), or  66-per-cent occupancy. There is no one in the emergency department waiting for a bed.

Of the 40 critical care beds, there are 21 patients occupying those at the moment (only one COVID-19 patient is in ICU). The hospital, with help from Laurentian University, Cambrian College, Greater Sudbury Paramedics and others, has transformed three floors of the Clarion Hotel on Elm Street downtown into a makeshift hospital for 95 alternative level of care patients.

This gives the hospital the ability to open as many as 92 critical care beds if needed.

He wanted the general public to know, though, that the hospital is still the place to go if you have an emergency. 

And now, because of COVID-19, wait times are at an all-time low.
 


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