Dam Is Full And Springing Leaks: Mississippi Doctors Say Health System Broken Since Delta
Dr. Jon Boyles needed an intensive-care unit.
His patient was critically sick with COVID-19. Others filled his emergency department at Neshoba County General Hospital, but this one was well beyond his capacity for care. The patient’s oxygen saturation declined enough for him to put them on a ventilator. But without an intensive-care unit and the staff to support his patient, slowly drifting away, Dr. Boyles knew he was treading water.
Later, when Boyles spoke to the Mississippi Free Press, last night after the end of his shift, his voice was nervous, filled with exhausted energy. He was run down and out of breath. He told the story of a single patient and the whole pandemic at once.
After ventilating the patient, he started, as always, by reaching out to the two major hospitals in Meridian, the first port of call for a Neshoba County transfer when times are good. They had nothing for him, no room for a critical patient. No surprises. Earlier in the week, when the doctor had called the same hospital, Boyles was told they’d be glad to take the patient—as long as he sent some nurses along with them.
“Every emergency department I’ve ever worked in has a red phone—we jokingly call it the Batphone,” Boyles explained to the Mississippi Free Press. “It’s directly connected to MED-COM,” a 24-7 communications center at the University of Mississippi Medical Center that has helped sort out the complicated ebb and flow of patient transfers.
Read more: https://www.mississippifreepress.org/19533/dam-is-full-and-springing-leaks-mississippi-doctors-say-health-system-broken-since-delta/