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Curry Health Network has relaxed its crisis care standards due to an increase in the availability of beds as well as the number of other hospitals being able to accept patient transfers.

However, the expanded emergency department space at its Brookings facility is still in effect, CHN Marketing Manager Cheryl McDermott told the Wild Rivers Outpost on Tuesday.

“CHN, at this time, is not planning to notify Oregon Health Authority (OHA) that it doesn’t want the option to use expanded space, allowing it to be utilized when patient volume is heavy,” McDermott said in an email.

Curry Health Network’s incident command team determined that the healthcare network that serves Curry County was no longer operating under crisis care standards as of 2:40 p.m. Monday, according to McDermott.

On Tuesday, McDermott said that the average number of emergency patients has decreased to “more normal levels.”

CHN can use its expanded emergency department space in Brookings until it notifies the state that it no longer wants to or when the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services 1135 waivers are no longer in effect, McDermott said. The CMS waivers are tied to the national COVID state of emergency and will be in effect until at least Jan. 11, 2023, she said.

Curry began implementing its crisis standards of care last Wednesday due to the inability of other hospitals to accept CHN patients needing a higher level of treatment.

Hospitals statewide were experiencing a capacity crisis due to the convergence of influenza A, COVID-19 and respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, Curry Health Network CEO Ginny Williams said last Friday.

On Monday, Williams told the Outpost that about 50 percent of patients presenting to CHN facilities have symptoms consistent with those viral infections.

In a video address to the community, Williams said CHN staff had registered as many as 20 patients in about an hour and a half. Some patients needing to be transferred to another facility had been waiting for more than 50 hours, she said.

“We had a few patients over the course of a couple days that we just couldn’t move,” Williams told the Outpost. “And it’s not because other hospitals weren’t participating.”

Three other hospitals in Oregon, Oregon Health and Science University, Legacy Emmanuel Medical Center and Providence Medical Center implemented crisis standards of care last week in response to the surge in viral infections. This state designation provides hospitals with greater flexibility, which includes allowing them to deviate from nursing staffing plans.

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