Monday 14 March 2022
Due to an increase in patients in hospital with COVID-19, combined with the PEH's Intensive Care Unit and Higher Dependency Unit being very busy, visitor restrictions are being introduced to try and help alleviate some of the current pressures.
For the time-being, we are asking that only one visitor per patient attends each day. All visitors must please be symptom-free and have a negative LFT before attending. Visits must be deferred if the visitor is symptomatic. Admissions to Loveridge Ward will be allowed one birthpartner and any paediatric admission can be accompanied by two main caregivers.
If it is possible based on the circumstances, we would ask anyone attending the Emergency Department to take an LFT before attending. Patients arriving via the Emergency Department should be accompanied by a carer or parent only.
We currently have nine patients in hospital with COVID-19, very few spare beds in ICU and HDU, and we are seeing a rise in cases within nursing and residential homes which causes a knock-on effect with our ability to transfer some patients.
Some elective surgeries and outpatient appointments will be postponed this week due to these challenges. We apologise to anyone affected.
Our community teams are also facing challenges and we would ask people who receive support from these teams to please contact Community Services if they become symptomatic and or positive for COVID-19.
Dr Peter Rabey, Hospital Director, said:
'The hospital is very busy at the moment, both in terms of patients needing acute support, an increase in COVID-19 cases and staffing challenges linked to COVID-19-related absences. We're introducing these measures for visitors to try and reduce the potential spread of the virus throughout the hospital. We will keep this under regular review and remove these measures as soon as possible. We thank the community in advance for their support.
'We've also had to postpone some elective surgery this week, which I know can be distressing for people who have prepared for their surgery only to have it postponed. It's an awful situation for them and I apologise to those affected.'
