Tree Top Hospital can treat 180 COVID-19 patients at full capacity

Tree Top Hospital, on Saturday, announced it that once it begins to operate at full capacity, it can treat up to 180 COVID-19 patients at any given time.

Tree Top, a private hospital owned by one of Maldives’ richest families, the Champa family, has been offered to the government to be repurposed as a designated medical facility to treat COVID-19 patients for three months.

At a National Emergency Operations Center press briefing on Saturday afternoon, Amr Safwat, Tree Top’s Consultant Anesthetist and ICU, said that the hospital planned on expanding its capacity in two phases.

During the first phase, the hospital will have the capacity to treat 46 patients at any given time. The hospital will have 15 ICU beds, 15 pre-ICU beds, and 15 post-ICU beds in this phase, said Dr. Safwat.

“This is the capacity we have now,” he said.

And once the hospital begins operating in full capacity, it can treat 180 patients at any given time, added Dr. Safwat.

Tree Top’s CEO David Feinberg said that the hospital’s directors had made the decision to offer to repurpose the hospital as a designated COVID-19 treatment facility because they believed it to be their patriotic duty to help Maldives overcome the crisis it now faces.

He said that all the hospital’s staff had offered their services.

The agreement between Tree Top and National Emergency Operations Center to use of the hospital’s resources to treat virus patients was signed on April 26, and the first virus patient was transferred to Tree Top on Wednesday.

The hospital is currently treating five virus patients, all of whom require advanced medical treatment such as oxygen therapy.

IGMH’s CEO Ibrahim Saleem said at the press briefing that the government would provide the equipment Tree Top needed in order to expand its capacity, and had already initiated planning for the expansion.

The government is also supplying medicine, some other medical equipment to Tree Top, along with more medical professionals to support the existing medical team at the hospital.