• Felipe Muñoz-Leyva, Anahi Perlas, Ki Jinn Chin, Mehdi Soheili, Qixuan Li, Ella Huszti, and Vincent Chan.
• Department of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine, University Health Network, Toronto Western Hospital, University of Toronto, 399 Bathurst St., Mc Laughlin Pavilion, 2-405, Toronto, ON, M5T 2S8, Canada.
• Can J Anaesth. 2023 May 1; 70 (5): 869877869-877.

PurposeSARS-CoV-2 poses a significant occupational health threat to health care workers performing aerosol-generating medical procedures, with a threefold increased risk of a positive test and predicted infection compared with the general population. Nevertheless, the personal protective equipment (PPE) configuration that provides better protection with lower contamination rates is still unknown.MethodsWe enrolled 40 practitioners with airway management training (anesthesiologists, anesthesia assistants/nurses) in an exploratory, simulation-based randomized study. We evaluated the performance of a novel, locally designed hood (n = 20) in terms of protection from surrogate contamination using an ultraviolet (UV) marker during a standardized urgent intubation procedure and a simulated episode of coughing in a high-fidelity simulation setting compared with standard PPE (n = 20). The primary outcome was the presence of residual UV fluorescent contamination on any base clothing or exposed skin of the upper body after doffing PPE assessed by a blinded evaluator.ResultsThe proportion of participants with residual contamination on any base clothing or exposed skin of the upper body after doffing was less than half in the hood PPE group compared with the standard PPE group (8/20 [40%] vs 18/20 [90%], respectively; P = 0.002).ConclusionsCompared with standard PPE, enhanced PPE with a locally designed prototype hood was associated with reduced contamination of the upper torso and fewer body areas being exposed to droplets after a simulated aerosol-generating scenario without designed airflow.Study RegistrationClinicalTrials.gov (NCT04373096); registered 4 May 2020.© 2023. Canadian Anesthesiologists' Society.

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