COLUMBIA, S.C. — On Monday, the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control's hospital bed occupancy numbers showed Richland County at 100 percent capacity. That meant there were no staffed hospital beds available.
However, that was not the case as Prisma Health, the largest hospital system in Richland County, explained that they had beds available.
DHEC explained that there was an error in reporting, saying in a statement:
Since July 22, the federal government has required hospitals nationwide to report data directly to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services through a new TeleTracking system, which replaces the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)'s National Healthcare Safety Network system that had been used by hospitals for reporting data throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. Currently, the TeleTracking system asks hospitals to report all of their available beds as one total number, not broken down by bed type as the NHSN system had. Therefore, hospitals' total number of beds reported includes pediatric beds, neonatal intensive care unit (ICU) bassinets, psychiatric beds, labor and delivery beds, rehabilitation beds and others. As a practical matter, not all of these bed types could be used for caring for adult patients hospitalized with COVID-19, or other medical issues.
DHEC's hospital bed tracking site only reports the inpatient or ICU beds available, meaning that hospitals have been reporting more beds than what DHEC's system accounted for.
DHEC explained that they are working with the South Carolina Hospital Association to come up with a better tracking system for the state.
A spokesman with the Governor's office also explained that the National Guard is called in when counties reach their capacity for hospital beds. The Guard provides relief for hospitals by setting up tents and hospital beds for patients.
Those tactics had not been used for Richland County, but have been used for Orangeburg County's Regional Medical Center and for hospitals in the Pee Dee area of the state.