TAMPA, Fla. -- While health officials in Tampa Bay warn that the long expected surge in COVID-19 patients is happening now at area hospitals, one facility that hasn't seen that yet is Memorial Hospital of Tampa.

"Right now, this is probably a little lower than what we're normally used to," said Chief Medical Officer Dr. Steven Merta of patient volumes as of Friday afternoon. "We have been able to pull several levers to prepare ourselves for that surge, which we see all around us."

That includes halting inpatient and outpatient elective surgeries except in certain cases.

"By doing that, we've taken a lot of the pressure off," said Merta, who noted Memorial is primarily a surgical hospital. "We've been able to reduce our ICU utilization because those patients who would need that bed in the ICU are not coming in at the moment."

Merta said seven of the hospital's 12 ICU beds were occupied Friday.

Extra nurses are also being called in to help. Merta said those include rapid response nurses HCA's West Florida Division is bringing in to help with COVID response among all its hospitals. Merta said Memorial is also monitoring PPE supplies.

Nurses with some HCA hospitals in Tampa Bay spoke out earlier this week to bring attention to what they said are unsafe working conditions and practices. Memorial staff were not among them. When asked how the team at Memorial is holding up, Merta said they're staying strong.

"I know there's the concern for burnout, I know there's concern for mental health," he said. "Right now, the pulse that I'm feeling here at Memorial with what we're dealing with, I'm not concerned at all."