People with minor injuries or cold symptoms won't be turned away from the emergency room at Butler Memorial Hospital. However, the hospital would like to see those people consult their primary care physician or visit one of Butler Health System's FasterCare facilities in person or through live online telemedicine to reduce waiting times in the emergency room, which is stressed from high patient volume and medical staff shortage, said Dr. David Rottinghaus, BHS chief medical officer.

“For one reason or another, medical staffing is less than it was during the (COVID-19) surge over winter. There's been a lot of retirement,” Rottinghaus said.

In addition, the hospital is treating 40 COVID-19 patients as well as patients with other serious conditions, he said. Five are currently being treated in the intensive care unit, according to a Thursday news release from the hospital.

“Like other health systems, we're stressed and we're experiencing some waits in the emergency room and seeing a large number of patients,” Rottinghaus said.

He said the hospital will not turn anyone away, but treating people with minor medical conditions in the emergency room is causing delays.

“If people come in, we'll definitely see them. There may be delays,” Rottinghaus said.

He said the health system wants to encourage appropriate use of the emergency room, but realizes some people might not have alternatives to the emergency room.

“We're not overwhelmed now, but we're feeling the strain,” Rottinghaus said. “We don't want to discourage emergency room care, but we want to make them aware of options. We want them to be aware of other resources. We don't want to discourage people from seeking care.”

In neighboring Allegheny County, emergency rooms are seeing hours-long emergency room wait times and staff shortages, prompting that county's hospitals to ask patients to not go to emergency rooms with minor health issues, according to published reports.