To Protect Health Care Workers Better, To Save More Lives With COVID-19

Abstract

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has thus far caused a total of 81,747 confirmed cases with 3283 deaths in China and more than 370,000 confirmed cases including over 16,000 deaths around the world by March 24, 2020. This issue has received extensive attention from the international community and has become a major public health priority. As the pandemic progresses, it is regrettable to know the health care workers, including anesthesiologists, are being infected constantly. Therefore, we would like to share our firsthand practical experience and perspective in China, focusing on the personal protection of health care workers and the risk factors related to their infection, based on the different stages of the COVID-19 epidemic in China.

Figure 1.

Dr Kaicheng Song with the precaution of personal protective equipment. Dr Song is an attending anesthesiologist in Department of Anesthesiology, PUMCH, Beijing, China. He voluntarily joined the national medical team for Wuhan on February 7, 2020, since then he has worked in the intensive care unit of Zhongfaxincheng campus of Tongji Hospital affiliated to Huazhong University of Science and Technology. At the time of this writing, Dr Song, together with 10 other anesthesiologists and operating room nurses from PUMCH, are still fighting COVID-19 at the frontlines in Wuhan. (Photograph by Dr Kaicheng Song.) COVID-19 indicates Coronavirus Disease 2019; PUMCH, Peking Union Medical College Hospital.

Figure 2.

Standardized precautions at Peking Union Medical College Hospital for anesthesiologists in different clinical settings. (1) Green cells: clean or relatively clean area (hospital public area, office, outpatient clinic, ward, etc) or low-risk procedure; yellow cells: possibly contaminated area or medium-risk procedure (ER, elective operations with febrile patients, etc); red cells: contaminated area or high-risk medical procedure (emergent intubation outside OR, fever clinic, suspected or confirmed COVID-19 cases, etc). (2) Hand hygiene is mandatory. (3) The disposable protective materials and other medical wastes should be handled according to ER or ward regulations to avoid cross-contamination. COVID-19 indicates Coronavirus Disease 2019; ER, emergency room; OR, operating room.