pandemic, to the stress in terms of addressing second and third surges of cases here at zuckerberg san francisco general, this year has been a bill challenge for our klein -- big challenge for our clinical teams and our community. and i remember the tears. i remember tears shed due to facing so many unknowns related to this new virus. i remember the tears shed after a long day of work, when staff were coming and asking questions about how we were planning to ration our supplies. i remember the fears of not knowing how bad each surge was going to be, and wondering if we would see the coming flood seen in other parts of our country and the world, and of course, i remember the tears of joy, pure joy, in sending our patients home to be reunited with loved ones, sometimes after many months of battling through illness here at our hospital. very proud to say we've cared for over 1500 patients during this pandemic, and this is a tribute and compliment to all of our tears, and serves as a source of pride to all of us here at zsfg. i'm deeply grateful for our hospital leadership, and i'm deeply grateful t

christopher caldwell is the chief of emergency medicine at zuckerberg san francisco hospital.reat adams but he said the number of patients he sees like her is up. >> before once a week or maybe a couple of times a month and now it is pretty much every show. shift. >> reporter: legalization of marijuana he says has played a role. dr. keith humphreys, a professor at stanford university in psychiatry agrees. >> the growth we are seeing in cannabis consumption is in this population of people who used to smoke once or twice a week an hour smoking many times a day and that is the critical risk factor for developing this condition. >> reporter: dr. humphreys says often times, people don't realize it is cannabis making them sit sick and they will use more to alleviate symptoms. >> there is nothing good or bad about the plant it can be useful and have health applications but else, it can have adverse effects. >> i don't want anyone else to go through what i went through and not know what it was and continue doing it. >> reporter: she says send she stopped using cannabis, her symptoms h

pandemic, to the stress in terms of addressing second and third surges of cases here at zuckerberg san francisco general, this year has been a bill challenge for our klein -- big challenge for our clinical teams and our community. and i remember the tears. i remember tears shed due to facing so many unknowns related to this new virus. i remember the tears shed after a long day of work, when staff were coming and asking questions about how we were planning to ration our supplies. i remember the fears of not knowing how bad each surge was going to be, and wondering if we would see the coming flood seen in other parts of our country and the world, and of course, i remember the tears of joy, pure joy, in sending our patients home to be reunited with loved ones, sometimes after many months of battling through illness here at our hospital. very proud to say we've cared for over 1500 patients during this pandemic, and this is a tribute and compliment to all of our tears, and serves as a source of pride to all of us here at zsfg. i'm deeply grateful for our hospital leadership, and i'm deeply grateful t

>> supervisors, we have a lot of detailed information from zuckerberg san francisco general hospitalregarding certain information regarding individuals, and we've partnered with other hospitals to identify individuals on the pathway who they see on a regular basis, and we're able to gather information from those hospitals. but when we're looking at the larger scale of individuals who may have been placed on a voluntary hold, those are information that we're not privy to them. but we're thinking of ways to obtain that information, again, through the hospital association of northern california. but it's a complicated issue and one contemplated in the l.p.s. audit report and thinking for individuals that are cycling in and out of crisis how the department of public health is able to access that information in a timely manner so that we can intervene. it is a big ask for the department of coordinated care and get ahead of people needing to be placed on conservatorship. >> supervisor haney: and do we know when our own -- i mean, i guess when hospitals -- well, i don't get in the sense --

>> supervisors, we have a lot of detailed information from zuckerberg san francisco general hospitalregarding certain information regarding individuals, and we've partnered with other hospitals to identify individuals on the pathway who they see on a regular basis, and we're able to gather information from those hospitals. but when we're looking at the larger scale of individuals who may have been placed on a voluntary hold, those are information that we're not privy to them. but we're thinking of ways to obtain that information, again, through the hospital association of northern california. but it's a complicated issue and one contemplated in the l.p.s. audit report and thinking for individuals that are cycling in and out of crisis how the department of public health is able to access that information in a timely manner so that we can intervene. it is a big ask for the department of coordinated care and get ahead of people needing to be placed on conservatorship. >> supervisor haney: and do we know when our own -- i mean, i guess when hospitals -- well, i don't get in the sense --

pandemic, to the stress in terms of addressing second and third surges of cases here at zuckerberg san francisco general, this year has been a bill challenge for our klein -- big challenge for our clinical teams and our community. and i remember the tears. i remember tears shed due to facing so many unknowns related to this new virus. i remember the tears shed after a long day of work, when staff were coming and asking questions about how we were planning to ration our supplies. i remember the fears of not knowing how bad each surge was going to be, and wondering if we would see the coming flood seen in other parts of our country and the world, and of course, i remember the tears of joy, pure joy, in sending our patients home to be reunited with loved ones, sometimes after many months of battling through illness here at our hospital. very proud to say we've cared for over 1500 patients during this pandemic, and this is a tribute and compliment to all of our tears, and serves as a source of pride to all of us here at zsfg. i'm deeply grateful for our hospital leadership, and i'm deeply grateful t

pandemic, to the stress in terms of addressing second and third surges of cases here at zuckerberg san francisco general, this year has been a bill challenge for our klein -- big challenge for our clinical teams and our community. and i remember the tears. i remember tears shed due to facing so many unknowns related to this new virus. i remember the tears shed after a long day of work, when staff were coming and asking questions about how we were planning to ration our supplies. i remember the fears of not knowing how bad each surge was going to be, and wondering if we would see the coming flood seen in other parts of our country and the world, and of course, i remember the tears of joy, pure joy, in sending our patients home to be reunited with loved ones, sometimes after many months of battling through illness here at our hospital. very proud to say we've cared for over 1500 patients during this pandemic, and this is a tribute and compliment to all of our tears, and serves as a source of pride to all of us here at zsfg. i'm deeply grateful for our hospital leadership, and i'm deeply grateful t

pandemic, to the stress in terms of addressing second and third surges of cases here at zuckerberg san francisco general, this year has been a bill challenge for our klein -- big challenge for our clinical teams and our community. and i remember the tears. i remember tears shed due to facing so many unknowns related to this new virus. i remember the tears shed after a long day of work, when staff were coming and asking questions about how we were planning to ration our supplies. i remember the fears of not knowing how bad each surge was going to be, and wondering if we would see the coming flood seen in other parts of our country and the world, and of course, i remember the tears of joy, pure joy, in sending our patients home to be reunited with loved ones, sometimes after many months of battling through illness here at our hospital. very proud to say we've cared for over 1500 patients during this pandemic, and this is a tribute and compliment to all of our tears, and serves as a source of pride to all of us here at zsfg. i'm deeply grateful for our hospital leadership, and i'm deeply grateful t

we were able to do was lots of work from people on this call and others, particularly as san francisco zuckerbergospital and our h.r. leadership, we were able to hire a number of nurses to address what had been chronic shortages there. i can also turn to jennie and greg with more information on this upcoming budget. >> i can respond to that. thank you, supervisor haney. a lot of moving pieces on that question. as dr. colfax says at the beginning of the pandemic, and we have been leading up to it, we did put in an expedited hiring process in place. there are two factors that play into, i think the question that you're getting at. there's the budget and the funding available, and there's our ability to get permanent hires into our budgeted positions, and so both of those, we have been working on. we established the expedited hiring process, and we have -- we'll get the updated data, but a lot of registered nurses through that process, reduced our vacancy rate significantly. at the same time, one of the things that we're seeing is since a year ago, we have had an increase in the number of our staff

we were able to do was lots of work from people on this call and others, particularly as san francisco zuckerbergospital and our h.r. leadership, we were able to hire a number of nurses to address what had been chronic shortages there. i can also turn to jennie and greg with more information on this upcoming budget. >> i can respond to that. thank you, supervisor haney. a lot of moving pieces on that question. as dr. colfax says at the beginning of the pandemic, and we have been leading up to it, we did put in an expedited hiring process in place. there are two factors that play into, i think the question that you're getting at. there's the budget and the funding available, and there's our ability to get permanent hires into our budgeted positions, and so both of those, we have been working on. we established the expedited hiring process, and we have -- we'll get the updated data, but a lot of registered nurses through that process, reduced our vacancy rate significantly. at the same time, one of the things that we're seeing is since a year ago, we have had an increase in the number of our staff