LINCOLN- Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts on Wednesday announced that the state is extending a directed health measure that limits elective surgeries and procedures.

It postpones inpatient surgeries that can wait four weeks or more without substantially changing a patient’s outcome. The measure has been in place since late August when Ricketts declared a hospital staffing emergency. It was set to expire Thursday and will now be in place through Oct. 31, unless the state extends it again.

Before the mandate, some health systems — including Nebraska Medicine and Bryan Health — had already limited such procedures. The measure, though, made it mandatory for all acute care hospitals, critical care hospitals and children’s hospitals.

Methodist Health System was among those that had announced a limit prior to the state’s health measure.

Dr. Garnet Blatchford, chief medical officer at Methodist Hospital and Methodist Women’s Hospital, told The World-Herald Wednesday that some surgeries canceled last month will now be canceled again.

People who are planning to have surgery may get a phone call with fairly short notice to postpone their procedure, she said.

“This involves a lot of extra work on nursing that’s already pretty stressed and pretty tired of the whole pandemic,” Blatchford said.

“As soon as it’s safe for them to come and have their surgery with good staff to take care of them, believe me, it will happen,” Blatchford said.

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