Kaiser Permanente will join several California hospitals and postpone non-urgent elective surgery in response to the current increase in COVID-19 cases across the state, Eyewitness News learns.
Hospital officials say the decision was made to release the team to focus on supporting COVID-19 units, while ensuring that Kaiser’s facilities have the capacity and personnel available to provide care.
“The exceptions to this pause in surgery are cancer and the presumed cases of cancer, as well as any situation where postponing surgery has a negative impact on the patient’s medical condition, including pain,” officials said in a statement.
The postponement runs until January 10 and no further elective surgeries will be scheduled until the end of next month.
Patients affected by this change are being contacted directly by hospital staff.
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