Patients ill with respiratory syncytial virus filled pediatric intensive care units across Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based Broward Health over the weekend, prompting the system to open overflow units, CBS Miami reported Oct. 11.
"What we're seeing here is that patients are progressing to a level that requires great care and some of them require intensive care management," Hector Rodriguez-Cortes, MD, chief of pediatrics at Broward Health Medical Center, told reporters at a local press conference.
Children are mostly being treated through supportive care.
"If they need oxygen, Motrin, Tylenol — just keep them comfortable [and] support their respiratory symptoms as they happen," Laurie Garcia, BSN, RN, pediatric ICU nurse manager at Broward Health, told the news outlet.
Symptoms are usually more severe among children who are immunocompromised, and those who have other underlying cardiac or respiratory issues.
Children's hospitals nationwide are being inundated with patients sick with respiratory viruses. In addition to RSV, many hospitals are seeing patients with the flu, enterovirus and rhinovirus.