Hospitals Get Ready As Omicron Surge Causes Record Case Numbers In State

The rise in COVID cases comes at a time when hospitals are dealing with a lack of staffing.

State health leaders said Oklahoma's peak might be just a few weeks away.

"I would say honestly last week was probably the most challenging week that we’ve experienced in this entire pandemic," said Integris Health Chief Nurse Executive Kerri Bayer.

She said what sets this Omicron variant surge apart from the rest is its speed.

"Our spike has hit so quickly, and so you know we also have a lot of our caregivers who were out with the flu or COVID or just differently illnesses," said Bayer.

Oklahoma is already dealing with a nursing shortage, and now, hospitals are losing nurses to isolation and illness.

In just the last three days, the state saw more than 27,000 new COVID cases, and health leaders predict there are even more that haven't been reported.

There are projections that show Oklahoma could see as many as 80,000 cases a day at the state's peak.

"It terrifies me the other thing I will say about those numbers is I believe a large majority of those patients are not being required hospitalization," said Bayer. "So that's what we want, that's what the vaccine does. It prevents hospitalization. However, there are still going to be a percentage that do become hospitalized."

Bayer said nurses are exhausted.

"The more and more patients they continue to see, it’s kind of hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel," said Bayer.

She said nurses are just hoping the projections are correct when it comes Oklahoma's peak.

"We anticipate it would be the later part of January before we would peak. Time's going to tell on that," said interim state Health Commissioner Keith Reed.

But he said the virus is hard to predict.

The good news with Omicron, they are seeing milder cases, and even with record case numbers, hospitals aren't seeing the proportionate increase that they did with previous surges.

"That enables us to absorb more cases without really jeopardizing our health care system," said Reed.