HOUSTON – Emergency room doctors in Southeast Texas say they are running out of hospital beds, and some patients are waiting hours, sometimes days to be admitted into a hospital.
As of Friday afternoon, Pile says 482 patients were waiting for hospital beds in his 25-county region.
An additional 120 patients are waiting for an ICU bed.
At Altus Baytown, a freestanding ER, Dr. Robert Velarde said they are facing something they have never seen before.
Due to a lack of hospital beds, if patients need to be admitted into a hospital for more specialized care, he says the delay is overwhelming.
Dr. Velarde says his ER staff has spent hours on the phone looking for hospitals that can accept his patients.
Earlier in the week, nearly 800 patients were waiting to be admitted into a hospital for an ICU or non-ICU bed. »