Healthcare workers struggle as Covid-19 patients flood emergency rooms

Hospitals and healthcare workers are struggling to cope with a flood of Covid-19 patients seeking treatment in the accident and emergency (A&E) department, many with mild or no symptoms and who do not require immediate medical attention.

This is despite the Ministry of Health announcing that test centres will be open for those looking to take a supervised self-administered antigen rapid test for free, and get the results reflected in their HealthHub record. This was to ease the pressure on hospitals, general practitioner clinics and polyclinics to help them focus on those who need medical attention.

When The Straits Times spoke to doctors in public hospital emergency rooms, many said they continue to see droves of patients who have tested positive on antigen rapid test kits but display little or no symptoms.

The doctors and healthcare workers The Straits Times spoke to requested anonymity, so their names have been changed.

Remy, 30, a doctor who works in the A&E department of a public hospital, said that as a result of the surge, doctors are seeing double the number of patients every day.

"Many of these patients have the mindset that because they have presented themselves to the A&E department, they need to be seen immediately," he said.

The bloated queues meant that frustration would set in as patients faced ever increasing wait times.

"Just a few days ago, I got screamed at for making a patient wait six hours without any updates and had to call the hospital's security personnel," said 26-year-old A&E doctor Claire.

Other departments in the hospital are also feeling the knock-on effects of the surge in numbers.

A consultant in the internal medicine department, Michael, 40, said that there were dialysis patients who could not be assigned a bed due to the overwhelming volume of other patients.

Staff nurse Shuqi, 26, said the ward she works in would have to operate with one or two fewer nurses, as they would be sent to help the A&E department. She said: "We should have six staff for a 38-bed ward, meaning one nurse staff to six patients, but now we have to run with just four nurses, which is almost double the workload."

Some doctors such as Jeanette, 28, have said that the mental stress caused by the attitude of certain patients can push many overworked healthcare workers past the breaking point.

"When they make a request which goes against hospital and government protocol and it is denied, they start to insist... it was never really a request to begin with, but a demand," she said.

The view was echoed by Claire, who said: "All we want to do is help. We really need the patients and their family members to be more understanding, and help us help them."

Remy said he saw many patients who, despite being young and healthy, would report symptoms that were out of proportion.

"Some request to go to the isolation facilities even though they may be able to self-isolate," he said.

"A big chunk of non-emergency cases stem from patients being entitled. Even though the Ministry of Health has called for the public to spare healthcare resources, I am not sure that this request will be met with social responsibility. People, unfortunately, will always try to game the system."