Flower Hospital to reduce intensive care unit beds

ProMedica Flower Hospital

ProMedica Flower Hospital is reducing the number of intensive care unit beds at the Sylvania hospital by the end of July in response to lower inpatient admissions.

The number of ICU beds will go from 16 to eight and will be consolidated from two floors to one, said Deana Sievert, senior vice president for patient care services and chief nursing officer at ProMedica, adding the same intensive care services will remain. 

“What that means is, we will have our ICU beds on one floor, so when you transition down into a step-down unit it will all be on one floor,” she said. 

Only half of the current 16 ICU beds are filled on a typical day, she said. In case of a surge in patient volume, such as during flu season, Ms. Sievert said they have plans to then increase capacity or initiate transfers to ProMedica Toledo Hospital. 

It’s part of a larger national trend of decreasing inpatient admissions and lengths of stay, due in part to more outpatient surgeries, she said. 

A study published last year by the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project found inpatient stays of all types from 2005-2014 dropped 6.6 percent nationwide, with decreases even higher for surgical and injury-related inpatient stays. 

Ms. Sievert said there were no job losses from the Flower bed reduction. Affected employees — primarily ICU nurses and nursing assistants — have been offered other jobs at Flower or elsewhere in the ProMedica system.