MMH Has Almost Completed Construction on 9th Floor For COVID-19 Patients

The floor will have 48 beds and will be designated as the COVID-19 floor.

According to NewsWest 9, COVID-19 cases have been on the increase in the Basin over the past few weeks but the difference of this wave as opposed to the last is 50% of those patients are ending up in critical care.

The spike over the summer only had about 20% of the patients ending up in critical care.

But the 9th floor of the Scharbauer Tower of Midland Memorial Hospital is expected to be completed this week.

“We want to cohort the COVID patients as much as possible," said Kit Bredimus, Chief Nursing Officer at Midland Memorial Hospital. "The ninth floor is the ideal space and we have designed it to handle this population because every room is monitored and can maintain negative pressure.”

Negative pressure is necessary to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and Bredimus explains how it is effective.

“Normally in a regular room the air would come out of the vents and push the air into the hallways to recirculate," Bredimus said. "On a reverse isolation room, the air is pulled from the halls and then vents out to the outdoors."

Bredimus says they will start moving COVID-19 patients to the 9th floor on November 9, 2020, but he hopes the floor does not become filled with COVID-19 patients.