With Oklahoma hospitals reporting some patients dying waiting for care at over-capacity hospitals and some being transferred to facilities in farflung states like South Dakota and Idaho amid the current COVID surge, the state's top health official said Thursday he believes state hospitals have the ability to take on more patients than they are.
"We talk weekly with the chief medical officers, and they, you know, they all tell us that they have beds available, they just don't have a lot of staffing. And that they're stressed. We know that they're stressed," Oklahoma State Department of Health Commissioner Dr. Lance Frye said during a media briefing held virtually Thursday afternoon.
Asked directly if Oklahoma hospitals had staffed bed capacity, Frye said he believed they did.
"That's a great question. We feel like we have hospital -- we have capacity in the state," Frye said.
The assertion runs counter to the picture being painted by many in Oklahoma's medical community.
"We have capacity, but I've been flying unstable patients to other states the past couple days?" tweeted Dr. Adrienne Taren, a Tulsa emergency room physician.
"When Lance Frye says there are available ICU beds in Oklahoma, this does not reflect reality," tweeted Dr. Josh Gentges, another Tulsa emergency physician.
"For weeks, all ICUs in Oklahoma have been maxed out. Every day recently, patients have been sent to out of state hospitals for an ICU bed because we don't have any open in Oklahoma. So if OSDH has magically found all these available beds, we'd love to hear where they are," wrote Dr. George Monks, immediate past-president of the Oklahoma State Medical Association.
Four Oklahoma City hospital systems -- INTEGRIS, OU Health, Mercy and SSM Health St. Anthony --reported no ICU beds were available in their systems on Wednesday or Monday of this week.
Frye attributed discrepancies in the state's reported available hospital capacity and what hospitals are releasing publicly to internal "disconnects" between hospital employees responsible for data entry and hospital communications staff.
"That person may be putting that in when their numbers are lowest in the day, and the person may be talking to you on the news because they're crowded at the moment, right? When their numbers are high," Frye said.
Frye said the state would need more assistance from hospitals to get a more accurate handle on capacity issues.
"Just this last week we spoke to them in our [chief medical officers] meeting and told them, 'Hey, we need, you know -- guys, we need your help. You know, we really would like to be reporting more accurately or giving a more accurate representation of what you're saying is going on in your hospitals, but all we have is what you're giving us,'" Frye said.
"That's really up to them. That's not our purview. You know, we don't -- can't go to each hospital and count hospital beds every day. So, you know, we're really reliant on them to do that for us," Frye said.
Asked again shortly before the briefing concluded whether Oklahoma had staffed beds available, Frye said, "Yes, from the data that we are being -- that we are seeing, they do."
Less than an hour after the state health department briefing concluded, the city of Stillwater declared a state of emergency due to the complete lack of staffed beds in their hospital, noting the state had agreed to assist in the construction of overflow tents and the soliciation of medical volunteers to handle the surge.
