AUSTIN, Texas -- As coronavirus cases and hospitalizations continue to spike in Texas, emergency room medical professionals are working on the front lines of the pandemic. 

“I just felt like it was God’s purpose for me to be an emergency physician, I haven’t regretted a single moment of it," said Dr. Diana Fite, an emergency room physician and president of the Texas Medical Association. 

Fite has been in Houston practicing medicine for 42 years, and an emergency room doctor for 40, but in her entire career, she says she’s never seen anything quite like COVID-19. 

“I've never been through something quite like this. We had quite a bit of changes when HIV and AIDS first developed, I remember that well. And problems with SARS regionally. There have been many times, but I've never seen it where it was this type of illness where we don't have any vaccination, we don't have any actual treatment for it," said Fite. 

Since Memorial Day, Texas has seen a rapid increase in coronavirus cases.

Over the weekend both Austin and San Antonio set new daily records for positive cases, and hospitalizations are also on the rise. 

In a press conference on Monday, Governor Greg Abbott said, “Hospitalizations for COVID-19 averaged just over 1,600 a day in the latter part of May. In the last four or five days hospitalizations have averaged more than 3,200 a day. To state the obvious, COVID-19 is now spreading it an unacceptable rate in Texas, and it must be corralled.”

Dr. Fite has been seeing the surge in cases first hand. 

“Several weeks ago we were maybe down to one or two a day maybe even none during the day. Of course, sometimes the presentations can be a little unusual, but we're talking about people with fever and cough and shortness of breath, those type of things. And now, a day doesn't go by that I don't see several patients like that," said Fite. 

The dramatic uptick in cases and hospitalizations has officials concerned about hospital capacity. 

The Texas Department of State Health Services is tracking available hospital beds and at the moment the Governor says there is plenty of room in hospitals for coronavirus patients.

However, the concern is that if the numbers continue to increase at this rate, that capacity could be overwhelmed. 

“They may have to encourage less elective surgeries or something like that to open up some more beds, because I know they're all trying to have a certain percentage of beds available for COVID patients, but they're filling up rapidly," said Fite. 

State and county officials are working on emergency surge plans for that scenario— if hospitals run out of beds, patients will be transferred to Type Two Alternate Care Sites like former clinics or medical facilities. 

Contract negotiations for those facilities are ongoing, but the hope is that they won’t be necessary. 

“Please please people take this seriously, socially distance, and wear masks and wash hands and stay home if you're at risk," said Fite.