ArticleThe Medical journal of Australia2021
Increasing ICU capacity to accommodate higher demand during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Article in The Medical journal of Australia, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 25 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
25 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Strategies employed by developed countries to facilitate the transition of internationally qualified nurses specialty skills into clinical practice: An integrative review.Nursing open · 2023Pooled it
- Optimising the Utilisation of Internationally Qualified Nurses' Specialty Skills: Insights From Recruiting Managers' Perspectives.Nursing open · 2026Article
- Optimizing Emergency Response in Hospitals: A Systematic Review of Surge Capacity Planning and Crisis Resource Management.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Review
- The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Intensive Care Nurses' Experience in Providing Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation Care.Nursing & health sciences · 2025Article
- Article
- Article
- Impact of COVID-19 pandemic on the accuracy of telephone triage of callers with shortness of breath and/or chest discomfort in Dutch out-of-hours primary care: A retrospective observational study.The European journal of general practice · 2024Observational
- Development of a Simple Scoring System for Predicting Discharge Safety from the Medical ICU to Low-Acuity Wards: The Role of the Sequential Organ Failure Assessment Score, Albumin, and Red Blood Cell Distribution Width.Journal of personalized medicine · 2024Article
- Care fragmentation and readmission mortality and length of stay before and during the COVID-19 pandemic: data from the National Readmissions Database, 2018-2020.BMC health services research · 2024Observational
- Workforce strategies during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic: a retrospective online survey at intensive care units in Germany.BMC health services research · 2024Article
- Adjustments in purchasing arrangements to support the COVID-19 health sector response: evidence from eight middle-income countries.Health policy and planning · 2024Article
- iSleepFirst: burnout, fatigue, and wearable-tracked sleep deprivation among residents staffing the medical intensive care unit.Sleep & breathing = Schlaf & Atmung · 2023Article
- Perceptions of intensive care triage in Australia and New Zealand in 2009 and 2023.Critical care and resuscitation : journal of the Australasian Academy of Critical Care Medicine · 2023Article
- The PhLIP team: Feasibility of a physiotherapy-led intensive prone positioning team initiative during the COVID-19 pandemic.Australian critical care : official journal of the Confederation of Australian Critical Care Nurses · 2023Observational
- Nursing workforce allocation in the intensive care units of COVID-19-designated hospitals: A nationwide cross-sectional survey in China.Nursing open · 2023Article
- Resource utilization and preparedness within the COVID-19 pandemic in Tunisian medical intensive care units: A nationwide retrospective multicentre observational study.Journal of infection and public health · 2023Observational
- The positive impact of COVID-19 on critical care: from unprecedented challenges to transformative changes, from the perspective of young intensivists.Annals of intensive care · 2023Review
- Thirty years of ANZICS CORE: A clinical quality success story.Critical care and resuscitation : journal of the Australasian Academy of Critical Care Medicine · 2023Article
- The Role of the Temporary Contracting and Visiting Doctor Program in Supporting the Health System during and after COVID-19 Pandemic in Saudi Arabia.Materia socio-medica · 2023Article
- Patient Outcomes and Unit Composition With Transition to a High-Intensity ICU Staffing Model: A Before-and-After Study.Critical care explorations · 2023Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
13 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectivesTo describe the short term ability of Australian intensive care units (ICUs) to increase capacity in response to heightened demand caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
designSurvey of ICU directors or delegated senior clinicians (disseminated 30 August 2021), supplemented by Australian and New Zealand Intensive Care Society (ANZICS) registry data.
settingAll 194 public and private Australian ICUs.
main outcome measuresNumbers of currently available and potentially available ICU beds in case of a surge; available levels of ICU-relevant equipment and staff.
resultsAll 194 ICUs responded to the survey. The total number of currently open staffed ICU beds was 2183. This was 195 fewer (8.2%) than in 2020; the decline was greater for rural/regional (18%) and private ICUs (18%). The reported maximal ICU bed capacity (5623) included 813 additional physical ICU bed spaces and 2627 in surge areas outside ICUs. The number of available ventilators (7196) exceeded the maximum number of ICU beds. The reported number of available additional nursing staff would facilitate the immediate opening of 383 additional physical ICU beds (47%), but not the additional bed spaces outside ICUs.
conclusionsThe number of currently available staffed ICU beds is lower than in 2020. Equipment shortfalls have been remediated, with sufficient ventilators to equip every ICU bed. ICU capacity can be increased in response to demand, but is constrained by the availability of appropriately trained staff. Fewer than half the potentially additional physical ICU beds could be opened with currently available staff numbers while maintaining pre-pandemic models of care.
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