International journal of surgery
-
International professional bodies have been quick to disseminate initial guidance documents during the COVID-19 pandemic. In the absence of firm evidence, these have been developed by expert committees, limited in participant number. This study aimed to validate international COVID-19 surgical guidance using a rapid Delphi consensus exercise. ⋯ Initial surgical COVID-19 guidance from the US, Europe and Australasia was widely supported by an international expert community, although a small number of contentious areas emerged. These findings should be addressed in future guidance iterations, and should stimulate urgent investigation of non-consensus areas.
-
COVID-19 has caused a global healthcare crisis with increasing number of people getting infected and dying each day. Different countries have tried to control its spread by applying the basic principles of social distancing and testing. Healthcare professionals have been the frontline workers globally with different opinions regarding the preparation and management of this pandemic. We aim to get the opinion of healthcare professionals in United Kingdom regarding their perceptions of preparedness in their workplace and general views of current pandemic management strategy. ⋯ Despite current efforts, it would seem this is not translating to a sense of security amongst the UK NHS workforce in terms of how they feel trained and protected. It is vital that healthcare professionals have adequate support and protection at their workplace and that these aspects be actively monitored.
-
Although Singapore was one of the first countries outside of China to be affected by COVID-19, for the first 2.5 months since its first reported case on January 23, 2020, it remained one of the few nations with successful containment of spread of the pandemic with little mortality and zero intra-hospital transmissions, without instituting a major lockdown of the country. In times of an infectious epidemic where medical subspecialties lead the frontline, a surgeon's role becomes rather vague. However, the only obstacle that stands in between the surgeon and fighting in the frontline of an infectious disease outbreak, is the traditional perception of what a surgeon can do. By presenting the strategies employed by our institution and its surgical unit, which remains the epicenter of the COVID-19 fight in Singapore, together with our medical counterparts, we hope to be able to improve our practices to respond and prevent the pandemic from escalating further as a collective community of surgeons across the globe. ⋯ With the varies strategies implemented, every surgical discipline and every surgeon should be unified and place their desire to operate aside. There should not be any differentiation between surgeon and physician, but instead, everyone has to work together as one united health care front battling the common enemy - COVID-19.
-
The end of 2019 was marked by the emergence of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Our problem is centered in the post operative follow up of those patients who underwent an elective procedure immediately before the isolation and those who require an emergency surgery. We outline the measures we have taken to reduce the possibility of spread of the virus.
-
Due to high-risk exposure of surgical residents to coronavirus, surgical residency programs have changed their training methods and working hours drastically. The purpose of this study is to find out the positive and negative impacts of the pandemic on surgical residency programs and on the lives of surgical residents. ⋯ The changes in the surgical residency programs amidst the pandemic has reduced the working hours, hands-on and clinical exposure of the surgical residents. Moreover, the situation has provided an opportunity to explore efficient methods of learning that can lead to lesser burnout. However, psychological burdens of surgical residents like fear of acquiring the infection should be appropriately addressed.