of patients transferred by plane due to overloaded services

The nursing staff are under tension in the face of a situation reminiscent of the worst hours of the pandemic. Faced with an overcrowding of intensive care services, the Antibes hospital (Alpes-Maritimes) transferred two patients on Wednesday December 29 to the Lille hospital center (North). The task is heavy, and the handling particularly delicate. “We must have a stability of more than 24 or 48 hours. At the respiratory level, he must have oxygen needs not too important, that is to say about 50, 60 or 70 maximum oxygen concentration“, declares the head of the service.

The stays of patients in intensive care sometimes last up to three months, causing congestion in the service. On Monday January 3, the Antibes hospital will open three additional beds, which also require additional nursing staff. What also worries the staff is the number of positive cases within the hospital team. “During the third wave, we had weeks with 35 or 40 health professionals who were positive for Covid (…) For the moment, we are rather around ten“, testifies the director of the affiliated hospital group.