Health officials have granted Boston-based Massachusetts General Hospital permission to add 94 inpatient beds to the hospital to confront capacity issues, ABC affiliate WCVB reported April 17.
The hospital requested permission to add beds amid an "unprecedented capacity crisis" in January. Its emergency department experienced critical levels of overcrowding nearly every day for the past six months, Massachusetts General said in a Jan. 19 news release. The hospital at one time was boarding between 50 and 80 ED patients every night who were waiting for a hospital bed to open. On Jan. 11, Massachusetts General had 103 patients boarding in the ED, representing one of the most crowded days in the hospital's more than 200-year history.
The state Department of Public Health Council voted unanimously to approve the hospital's request to add 40 intensive care beds and 54 medical or surgical beds. The approval is conditional on additional reporting from the hospital, according to the report.