A rising number of COVID-19 patients in Elkhart County is placing a strain on Elkhart General Hospital.
Dr. Michelle Bache, vice president of medical affairs for Elkhart General Hospital, said, “We are literally at capacity. We do not have any more room to go here.”
Goshen Hospital is not experiencing capacity concerns at this point, but Chief Medical Officer Dr. Daniel Nafziger said that could change quickly if other hospitals have to transfer cases.
Transfers could be a reality for Elkhart.
“We had a big spike in the COVID activity in the area,” Bache said. “Basically, over the past month it’s been creeping up and really over the past week it has increased dramatically. For instance, our census for COVID patients, the number that we have in the hospital today is basically three times higher than it was a month ago. And our deaths have also increased. So, if you look at the total number of deaths we had around Labor Day, we’ve gone up 40 percent since then.”
Click here to read the full story in the Goshen News by Sheila Selman.
Memorial Hospital of South Bend is also feeling strained by the COVID activity, Bache said. That hospital and Elkhart General are members of the Beacon Health System.