Influx in trauma patients forces hospital to postpone scheduled surgeries
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POCATELLO — Portneuf Medical Center was forced to postpone scheduled surgeries Tuesday due to an increase in trauma patients.
“Portneuf Medical Center focuses on high quality, safe patient care,” PMC spokeswoman Mary Keating told EastIdahoNews.com in a statement. “Today, we experienced a high volume of patients in need of a high level of care due to multiple traumas in the region.”
Surgeries that were postponed were limited to “non-urgent, inpatient” — or elective — surgeries.
EastIdahoNews.com received an email from a reader about Portneuf’s lack of beds Tuesday. In the email, the readers says they had been admitted Monday for surgery.
“They have me in a recovery room by the operating room since yesterday because they had no rooms I could be placed in,” the email reads. “The nurse who is the manager for the operation rooms just told her staff to call the doctors to cancel elective procedures. The hospital does not have any rooms for them. They can only take emergency trauma patients.”
The statement from Keating says PMC is able to continue providing emergency care, including “essential and urgent” surgeries and operations not requiring patients to stay in the hospital.
“Our dedicated team of caregivers, while extremely busy, continue to work diligently to care for all patients, including the increased number of individuals experiencing COVID, flu and respiratory illnesses in our community,” the statement says.