{"id":40602,"date":"2024-01-02T17:47:46","date_gmt":"2024-01-02T22:47:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=40602"},"modified":"2024-01-02T17:47:52","modified_gmt":"2024-01-02T22:47:52","slug":"lakeland-regional-health-sees-covid-19-and-flu-cases-double-over-the-holidays","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2024\/01\/02\/lakeland-regional-health-sees-covid-19-and-flu-cases-double-over-the-holidays\/","title":{"rendered":"Lakeland Regional Health sees COVID-19 and flu cases double over the holidays"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Dr. Tim Regan drove to work Tuesday mentally preparing himself for what he knew would be a busy day in the Lakeland Regional Health emergency room.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\u201cRight after New Year\u2019s and there\u2019s a lot of respiratory illness in the community, people have now shaken off their holiday and are looking to feel better. So we do see a lot of traffic through the emergency department this time of year,\u201d said Dr. Regan, the hospital\u2019s Chief Medical Officer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Dr. Regan, patients with COVID-19 and flu have doubled at Lakeland Regional Health, with those cases still making up less than 10% of total hospitalizations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Most COVID-19 infections now are causing cold-like symptoms, he said, which can be treated with ibuprofen and decongestants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Patients are also coming in with RSV.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou tend to talk about RSV in children, but elderly people and people who are at risk for illness are at risk for RSV as well and it can have bad outcomes,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pamela Wood, who lives in Lakeland, said she had a persistent cough and her doctor tried everything to prevent her from getting RSV.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cJust had a head cold and normally I can shake them off and this time I didn\u2019t, had a bad cough. Went to the doctor and he gave me an antibiotic and steroid shot and meds,\u201d she said. \u201cWhen you get 70 years old, you can\u2019t shake this stuff off like you could when you were younger.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jo Hair, a snowbird who winters in Lakeland, said her family had a firsthand experience with severe respiratory illness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 \u201cWe did have a child in the family up north that was hospitalized with RSV so it brings to light everybody should be paying attention, continue doing what you should be doing,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Luckily, that infant recovered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meanwhile, data from the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention shows<\/a> COVID-19 hospitalizations are \u201clow\u201d in all Florida counties except for Sarasota, Desoto and Charlotte counties, which are \u201cmedium.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When it comes to influenza, according to the CDC as of Dec. 23<\/a>, Florida is at a \u201chigh\u201d level of cases, surrounded by states at a \u201cvery high\u201d level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat is to be predicted this time of year, with influenza being very seasonal throughout central Florida. We\u2019ve seen greater numbers of influenza which sort of correlates to years in the past,\u201d said Dr. Jarett Gregory, an urgent care physician at Watson Clinic\u2019s south campus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said it is the combination of cooler weather, people traveling and visiting with family over the holidays and snowbirds coming to Florida that leads to the spike in illness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve certainly seen a higher number of acuity, higher number of cases, certainly quite a bit busier than we have been in the months previous,\u201d said Dr. Gregory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said the timing of a doctor\u2019s visit is an important factor when it comes to getting effective treatment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf a patient\u2019s had cough, cold, fever or body aches for one to two days, they want to act more promptly rather than waiting. If they can be seen and evaluated over the next 24 to 48 hours treatment and be initiated and often make a big difference and help them to recover much more quickly,\u201d said Dr. Gregory.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dr. Tim Regan drove to work Tuesday mentally preparing himself for what he knew would be a busy day in the Lakeland Regional Health emergency room. \u201cRight after New Year\u2019s… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":40603,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"{title}\n\n{excerpt}\n\n{url}","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":71799,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[12,14],"tags":[7169],"class_list":["post-40602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local","category-news","tag-lakeland-regional-health-sees-covid-19-and-flu-cases-double-over-the-holidays"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40602","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40602"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40602\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40603"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40602"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40602"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40602"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}