Overcrowded hospitals drop plan to allow nurses to provide repeat prescriptions to Hong Kong patients
Pressure on understaffed body eased slightly this week but health secretary warns of a possible second peak
The overcrowded public hospitals have dropped the idea of asking nurses to prescribe medicine to stable patients due to the objection of its medical staff, said the Hospital Authority’s director on Thursday.
It comes as the burden of the understaffed body eased slightly this week, with the number of attendants at the Accident and Emergency Unit dropping to the normal level of around 5,400 per day – compared with a peak of more than 7,000 in the past few weeks.
The overall occupancy of medical inpatient beds has dropped to 104 per cent from a peak of 130 per cent in some major hospitals, but the rate still means that some temporary beds have to be placed in between beds and along the corridors.
Secretary for Food and Health Dr Ko Wing-man said on Thursday that there was a trend for the flu cases to drop slightly.
“From the overall trend, the flu season should have already reached its peak and is now starting to drop slightly,” Ko said. “But we could not rule out at this stage that there would be two peak periods this year. We need to observe closely.”
Dr Cheung Wai-lun, director of cluster services, worried that the demand would rise again in the coming two weeks, placing another capacity crisis to the public sector which is in short of at least 700 nurses and 250 doctors.