COVID-19: Hospitalizations
Looking at hospital capacity and numbers of people hospitalized with COVID-19 helps us understand the effect that COVID-19 is having on our hospitals and health care system. It also helps us see how well our hospitals would be able to handle an increase in cases from COVID-19 or other illnesses like influenza.
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How high are COVID-19 hospitalizations and how much capacity do hospitals have to handle a surge?
The hospital capacity dashboard shows trends in the number of COVID-19 inpatients, including those who are in intensive care units (ICU). These data are reported to DHS by hospitals. The dashboard also displays the percent of hospital beds and ICU beds that are currently in use.
Understanding and maintaining some availability of these key resources is critical at any time, but especially if COVID-19 hospitalizations (or any other hospitalizations, including for influenza) start to increase rapidly.
Please note:
- October 4, 2022: This visualization is using an updated model for hospital bed availability to improve the accuracy of that estimate. As a result of this update, historical data on number of hospital beds and beds immediately available has also been updated.
How high are COVID-19 hospitalizations and how much capacity do hospitals have to handle a surge?
These data describe patients currently hospitalized in an inpatient bed who have laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 and the capacity of hospitals to admit more patients.
Data sources: Hospital capacity data are pulled from two sources:
- HHS Teletracking, which collects hospital COVID-19 data mandated by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) for all hospitals registered with the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services (CMS);
- Emergency Management Resource (EMResource) system, in which participating Wisconsin hospitals report status updates daily.
These data are only reported by Healthcare Emergency Readiness Coalition (HERC) region, as not all counties have hospitals.
Please note:
- October 4, 2022: The COVID-19 Hospitalizations and Hospital Capacity dashboard has been updated to utilize bed use measures reported to HHS. Historical data was also transformed to use this new metric and the change did not affect utilization trends.
Hospitalized patients
This count is the number of patients currently hospitalized in an inpatient bed who have laboratory-confirmed COVID-19. This count includes patients within and outside of ICU and includes any patients in observation status.
Patients in ICU
This count includes the number of patients in ICU who have laboratory-confirmed COVID-19. This count is a subset of all hospitalized COVID-19 patients.
Trajectory of patient hospitalizations
This indicator is the measure of change in patients over the course of the selected data period. To be considered growing or shrinking, the percent change of the total count of patients from the first week in the data period to the second week must be at least 10%. The slope generated by a linear regression of the hospital counts over the entire data period must also be considered statistically significant (for example, p-value < 0.05).
| Hospitalizations trajectory status | Value (change from prior 7-day period to most recent 7-day period) |
|---|---|
| Shrinking | Percent change in hospitalizations or ICU stays is less than or equal to negative 10 percent, and the slope generated by a linear regression of hospitalizations or ICU stays over the data period is statistically significant (p-value is less than 0.05). |
| Growing | Percent change in hospitalizations or ICU stays is greater than or equal to 10 percent, and the slope generated by a linear regression of hospitalizations or ICU stays over the data period is statistically significant (p-value is less than 0.05). |
| No Significant Change |
Cell count is large enough and any other conditions besides those that meet the "shrinking" or "growing" statuses described above. |
| Not Classified | Cell count is not large enough for statistical process to be robust enough to forecast. |
Hospital beds
This metric is the percent of beds in use out of all staffed inpatient beds, which includes overflow, observation, and active surge/expansion beds used for inpatients as well as ICU beds.
ICU beds
This metric is the percentage of ICU beds in use out of the total number of staffed inpatient ICU beds. This is a subset of all hospital beds.
Hospital Peak Capacity
The peak capacity statistics measure the percent of hospitals that have listed a status of "Peak Capacity" in their daily reporting. We break these down to hospital, ICU, and Medical and Surgical (Med/Surg) unit levels. On a hospital level, this metric will include hospitals on "Bypass" status, which indicates the facility has experienced a major internal emergency and cannot treat any patients including self-referrals, by EMS or Inter-facility transfers.
These statistics aim to measure how many hospitals are at a critical level of capacity and are approaching or have reached a state where they can no longer accept more patients.
For more information, please visit the Frequently Asked Questions webpage.
We plan to update our data each Wednesday by 5 p.m.
Get vaccinated
One of the most effective ways to stop the spread of COVID-19 is to get vaccinated. COVID-19 vaccines are safe, effective, free, and now widely available.
