https://boston.cbslocal.com/2021/11/17/boston-medflight-out-of-state-hospitals/

BOSTON (CBS) – Some critically ill patients onboard Boston MedFlight helicopters — bound for one of the city’s several hospitals — have flown into a harsh reality of late. No available ICU beds.

“That’s happened half a dozen times in the last 10 days,” says Boston MedFlight CEO Maura Hughes.

Instead, they went to hospitals in neighboring states — Rhode Island, Connecticut and New Hampshire.

“It’s not a great solution,” Hughes says, “particularly for the patient’s family, when you tell them ‘Yes, we have a bed. But it’s in Connecticut.”

Boston MedFlight — a non-profit that shuttled 5,700 patients last year by chopper, plane and ground ambulance — is calling attention to the troublesome “perfect storm” that’s filling local hospital beds — and not just in the intensive care ward.

Experts say Covid-19 is a fraction of the problem — but not the problem itself.

For starters, Boston MedFlight is carrying much sicker patients these days — and more of them — because so many people put off getting medical care for their health issues during the pandemic.

“What we’re seeing,” says CEO Hughes, “is a high volume of critically ill patients.”

The second factor is seriously understaffed hospitals. Almost one-in-five healthcare workers have quit since the spring of 2020 — half a million this past August alone — according to the US Labor Department.

And third, there’s the mental health crisis — with hospitals finding themselves, unfortunately — on the front lines.

“The emergency rooms are taking care of those patients,” says Hughes, “but they really need psychiatric care not medical care.”