80 patients on PGH’s waitlist for charity ward, says hospital spox

Facade of the UP – Philippine General Hospital. Image from the PGH website

MANILA, Philippines — Eighty patients are awaiting to be admitted at the charity ward of the Philippine General Hospital (PGH) as the facility also records over 90-percent bed occupancy for COVID-19 dedicated beds, the hospital’s spokesperson said Tuesday.

“Based on the data from our transfer command center, approximately 80 patients are on our waitlist requesting to be admitted from their homes or transferred from another hospital,” PGH spokesperson Dr. Jonas Del Rosario said in a text message to INQUIRER.net.

Del Rosario explained that these waitlisted patients cannot be admitted right away at the PGH charity ward yet because many patients also need beds at the hospital’s intensive care unit (ICU).

“We cannot admit them because many need an ICU bed or dialysis. Our rooms are filled up right away by patients who are severely ill who walked in to our ER (emergency room),” he added.

In an earlier interview with ABS-CBN’s Teleradyo, Del Rosario also reported that 234 of the 250 COVID-19 dedicated beds at the PGH are currently occupied.

He shared that the situation at the hospital has not yet changed despite the implementation of the enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) and modified ECQ in the NCR Plus.

“Ang aming ICU ay puno pa rin, ang aming emergency room ay puno din, maraming tinatanggap na pasyente [Our ICU is full, our emergency room is full as well, we are accepting a lot of patients],” he added.

The Department of Health earlier said that the healthcare utilization rate should be less than 50 percent for the government to consider placing the NCR Plus under the less stringent general community quarantine.

The country currently has 69,466 active COVID-19 cases as of Monday, including 7,255 new infections.

JPV