Maryland Hospital ERs At Capacity Due To RSV Have Had To Transfer Young Patients Out Of State

Pediatricians at Sinai Hospital in northwest Baltimore are saying emergency departments are slammed with RSV cases.

Shannon Rosenbaur recorded video of her 4-month-old son, Bodhi, in which his labored breathing can be seen.

"He started showing cold symptoms and they progressed and got worse until the middle of the night, last Wednesday night, where he woke up kind of like choking, gasping for air," Rosenbaur said.

She took him to the emergency department at Sinai, where doctors put him on oxygen and diagnosed him with RSV.

"We were in the (emergency department) for 13 or 14 hours, and there were no beds at the time in Maryland. We were on a transfer list or something," Rosenbaur said.

Eventually, a bed opened up and Bodhi stayed in the hospital for three and a half days.

Dr. Scott Krugman, vice chairman of pediatrics at Sinai, said children's hospitals across the Mid-Atlantic are reaching capacity due to RSV. He told 11 News hospitals around Maryland have had to transfer pediatric patients out of state to Virginia and Delaware.

"When we reach our capacity, there's increased wait times. So, instead of having 40 kids in the emergency room one day, we have 80. And, if you're trying to get 80 kids through an emergency room, it's really hard to do that in a timely fashion. So, wait times have increased," Krugman said.