Eastern Iowa healthcare facilities recovering from IV shortage
Since Hurricane Maria knocked out key medical supply manufacturers in
Three factories operated by
The
Some hospitals, including
"We appear to be coming out of the shortage, but what is more unclear is how long that full recovery will take," Sinclair said.
Officials a the
As a result, nurses and physicians turned to other sizes of the bags and to other fluids, which eventually caused shortages in those solutions as well.
"We are feeling the strain on resources, but we never at any time had complications that would compromise our patient care," said
"We are working to minimize impact to patient care and services at UnityPoint Health-
Some hospitals, such as
"Here at UI Health Care, we are fortunate to have facilities that allow us to take the raw materials for making both of these solutions," Brownlee said. "We combined those together -- sterile water plus dextrose -- and we would actually make the right concentration of fluid.
"There was a period of time we were having to do that on a regular basis because we just couldn't buy enough of the fluids that we needed," he said.
But with this year's flu season -- which has resulted in 77 flu-related deaths throughout the state, according to the most recent
"We have seen our inventory decrease a little bit because of the flu, but we're still holding steady and we have not had to turn any patients away," Brownlee said.
National and state health officials have emphasized the severity of this year's flu season, and it's only expected to get worse. The
The
UIHC was among area hospitals that implemented patient-visit restrictions due to influenza, and officials there are expecting the high rate flu-related patient visits to continue.
Brownlee said he believes they have enough IV fluids stock right now to get through the peak of the flu season. That is expected to hit sometime during the beginning of this month state health officials have said.
Other area hospitals remain cautiously optimistic their supply of saline, dextrose and other IV fluids will return soon, and will not be hugely impacted by this year's flu season.
"I feel confident if we see an increase in flu-related hospitalizations, there will not be any negative impact on patient care," Sinclair said.
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