Thread by @RANDCorporation

Creative measures are needed to meet the critical care demands of #COVID19.

This quick-turn study and online calculator—our first self-funded research response to the pandemic but not our last—can help health officials plan for patient surges. [thread]

bit.ly/3bQ2iv6

Hospitals can prepare for a surge of patients critically ill with COVID-19, but it will require hospital leaders, practitioners, and regional officials to adopt drastic measures that challenge the standard way of providing care.

This new analysis summarizes a range of evidence-based and promising strategies for creating critical care capacity in U.S. hospitals.

Our researchers identified two tiers of activities that hospitals can take...

Tier 1 includes strategies to expand critical care capacity without significantly affecting the ability to provide other medical care. These approaches include acquiring additional ventilators from stockpiles and converting some operating rooms to critical care units.

Tier 2 focuses on crisis capacity strategies that are likely to significantly affect routine care delivery and operations.

This tier might include turning regular hospital beds into critical care beds and reopening shuttered hospitals. It also includes changing staffing and supervisory ratios and altering standards of care.

"Creating the critical care capacity needed for the surge in #COVID19 patients will require creative thinking about the allocation and use of space, staff, and the stuff needed to provide critical care.” — Dr. Mahshid Abir

Our simple-to-use online tool allows decisionmakers at all levels—hospitals, health care systems, states, regions—to estimate current critical care capacity and rapidly explore strategies for increasing it: bit.ly/2R6nIfd

Please share with your networks. /end