Photo/Illutration Kenji Tsushima, assistant director of the International University of Health and Welfare Narita Hospital in Narita, Chiba Prefecture, sees a COVID-19 patient in late January. (Provided by the International University of Health and Welfare Narita Hospital)

The growing number of elderly COVID-19 patients who need hospital care has overloaded health care services at areas that are short-handed because infected staff members have missed work.

More hospital beds have been made available during the current sixth wave of infections compared with the fifth wave last year. And the number of COVID-19 patients in serious condition is also lower.

But the more contagious Omicron strain is causing problems.

The International University of Health and Welfare Narita Hospital in Narita, Chiba Prefecture, has secured 71 beds for COVID-19 patients.

As of Feb. 9, 24, or 80 percent, of the 30 hospitalized COVID-19 patients were 70 or older, and some of them had pneumonia.

Six, or 20 percent, of the patients required oxygen inhalation because their blood oxygen saturation level was 93 percent or lower.

About 20 patients could not voluntarily move from their beds and required two nurses each to change their diapers or clean their bodies.

On average, one nurse takes care of about six patients, including helping them eat.

“We debate every day over how many patients we can take in today or tomorrow, but it is a full plate,” said Kenji Tsushima, assistant director of the hospital. “There are many patients whose needs for care are high.

“Nurses have been overwhelmed and say the burden is too heavy and they are at their breaking point,” he said.

Infection clusters at a nursing home and other facilities in the area have fueled the increase in hospitalized elderly patients.

Some of these COVID-19 patients require care and rehabilitation services until they can eat on their own and recover enough to return to their nursing homes. A physical therapist and speech therapist offer such rehabilitation at the hospital.

But it can also take some time for patients to be transferred to other hospitals for the convalescent phase.

“We anticipated an increase of elderly patients because the development of symptoms cannot be stopped even if they are vaccinated,” Tsushima said. “But we have barely gotten by every day just offering medical and nursing care.”

He said that if the situation continues, hospital beds will remain full and elderly patients will have nowhere to go.

Tsushima urged government officials to immediately take measures, such as setting up medical facilities exclusively for elderly COVID-19 patients.

According to a health ministry survey, the number of new patients who are 70 or older exceeded 100,000 during the three-week period until Feb. 8.

(This article was written by Yoshinori Hayashi, Akiyoshi Abe and senior staff writer Tokiko Tsuji.)

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