• Mauro Zago, Selman Uranues, Marco Enoc Chiarelli, Samuele Grandi, Luca Andrea Fumagalli, Mario Tavola, Massimo Chiarugi, Diego Mariani, Valerie Wienerroither, Hayato Kurihara, and Abe Fingerhut.
• Robotic and Emergency Surgery Department, General Surgery Division, A. Manzoni Hospital, ASST Lecco, Via dell'Eremo 9/11, 29300, Lecco, Italy. m.zago@asst-lecco.it.
• Eur J Trauma Emerg Surg. 2020 Aug 1; 46 (4): 731-735.

BackgroundSurgery in the era of the current COVID-19 pandemic has been curtailed and restricted to emergency and certain oncological indications, and requires special attention concerning the safety of patients and health care personnel. Desufflation during or after laparoscopic surgery has been reported to entail a potential risk of contamination from 2019-nCoV through the aerosol generated during dissection and/or use of energy-driven devices. In order to protect the operating room staff, it is vital to filter the released aerosol.MethodsThe assemblage of two easily available and low-cost filter systems to prevent potential dissemination of Coronavirus via the aerosol is described.ResultsForty-nine patients underwent laparoscopic surgeries with the use of one of the two described tools, both of which proved to be effective in smoke evacuation, without affecting laparoscopic visualization.ConclusionThe proposed systems are cost-effective, easily assembled and reproducible, and provide complete viral filtration during intra- and postoperative release of CO2.

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