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Sam

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  1. Sam
    More than 1 in 10 Covid patients died within five months of being discharged from hospital, while almost a third of those who survived the virus had to be readmitted, new research has warned.
    Papers released by the governments Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) also revealed half of patients in hospital with the virus suffered complications, with one in four struggling when they got back home.
    Younger patients under the age of 50 were more likely to suffer complications.
    The reports present the first substantial evidence that Covid could be the cause of significant long term ill-health, with the virus attacking the body’s organs and causing diseases of the liver, heart, lungs and kidneys.
    Read full story
    Source: The Independent, 20 February 2021
  2. Sam
    New research led by researchers at King’s College London suggests that restricting testing to the ‘classic triad’ of cough, fever and loss of smell which is required for eligibility for a PCR test through the NHS may have missed cases. Extending the list to include fatigue, sore throat, headache and diarrhoea would have detected 96% of symptomatic cases.
    A team of researchers at King’s and the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) analysed data from more than 122,000 UK adult users of the ZOE COVID Symptom Study app. These users reported experiencing any potential COVID-19 symptoms, and 1,202 of those reported a positive PCR test within a week of first feeling ill.
    While PCR swab testing is the most reliable way to tell whether someone is infected with the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus that causes COVID-19, the analysis suggests the limited list of three does not catch all positive cases of COVID-19.
    Testing people with any of the three ‘classic’ symptoms would have spotted 69% of symptomatic cases, with 46 people testing negative for every person testing positive. However, testing people with any of seven key symptoms - cough, fever, anosmia, fatigue, headache, sore throat and diarrhoea - in the first three days of illness would have detected 96% of symptomatic cases. In this case, for every person with the disease identified, 95 would test negative.
    Researchers also found users of the Symptom Study App were more likely to select headache and diarrhoea within the first three days of symptoms, and fever during the first seven days, which reflects different timings of symptoms in the disease course. Data from the ZOE app shows that 31% of people who are ill with COVID-19 don’t have any of the triad of symptoms in the early stages of the disease when most infectious.
    Read full story
    Source: King's College London, 17 February 2021
  3. Sam
    Staff at a Midlands hospital trust told regulators they had repeatedly raised safety concerns internally without action being taken.
    The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has downgraded maternity services at Worcestershire Acute Hospital from “good” to “requires improvement” following an inspection prompted by the whistleblowers’ concerns.
    Staff had reported “continuously escalating” staffing level concerns to senior managers, but said they got “no response”. Some said they were fearful of raising concerns internally.
    Whistleblowers also reported delays to induction of labour, with examples of women waiting up to a week to be induced instead of one to two days. Managers said women who suffered delays were risk assessed.
    The CQC also identified a risk women might not be informed of significant harm caused to them or their babies following an incident, due to the way the trust was grading some babies who were admitted to the neonatal unit. However, it added: “When things went wrong, staff apologised and gave patients honest information and suitable support.”
    The report added the trust’s leaders were aware of the challenges in maternity, but “timely” action was not always taken to address the concerns.
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 19 February 2021
  4. Sam
    Nearly 20 major healthcare bodies are appealing to the Prime Minister for better personal protection against coronavirus.
    They say at least 930 health and care workers have died of COVID-19 and more are experiencing long-term effects.
    In a letter, they say measures to stop airborne spreading are "inadequate" and call for urgent improvement in masks and other defences against variants.
    The government said it was monitoring evidence on airborne transmission and would update advice "where necessary".
    The organisations involved represent a wide range of health professionals, from doctors and nurses to dieticians and physiotherapists. Their approach to Downing Street follows repeated efforts to raise the issue with others in government.
    With health and care workers at three to four times greater risk of becoming infected than the general public, the plea to Boris Johnson is to make an "urgent intervention to prevent further loss of life". It says current policies focus on contaminated surfaces and droplets - for which the best defences are hand hygiene and social distancing - but not on airborne transmission by tiny infectious aerosols.
    The groups are demanding:
    ventilation is improved better respiratory protection, such as FFP3 masks, are provided healthcare guidance reflects the evidence of airborne transmission. Read full story
    Source: BBC News, 19 February 2021
  5. Sam
    At home early abortions pose no greater risk and allow women to have the procedure much earlier on in their pregnancy, research has found.
    The findings have sparked calls from leading healthcare providers for the option, which was rolled out in the wake of lockdown measures last spring, to be made permanent.
    Researchers, who conducted the UK’s largest study into abortions, discovered there were no cases of significant infection which necessitated the woman to go to hospital or have major surgery.
    The study, conducted by the British Pregnancy Advisory Service and MSI Reproductive Choices, drew attention to the fact that despite misinformation to the contrary, not one individual died from having an at home early abortion.
    Eight in ten women said at home abortions were their preferred choice and they would opt for it in the future, while waiting times from when the woman has her consultation to treatment improved from 11 days to 7 days.
    Dr Jonathan Lord, medical director for MSI Reproductive Choices UK, said: “Being able to access abortion care earlier in pregnancy has also reduced the low complication rate even further.”
    Dr Lord added: “Telemedicine has provided a lifeline for vulnerable women and girls who cannot attend consultations in-person. We have seen a major increase in safeguarding disclosures, including from survivors of domestic and sexual violence, as they can talk more freely about distressing and intimate details from the privacy of their own home at the beginning of the Covid emergency."
    Read full story
    Source: The Independent, 19 February 2021
  6. Sam
    A firm which reviews healthcare apps for several NHS trusts says 80% of them do not meet its standards.
    Failings include poor information, lack of security updates and insufficient awareness of regulatory requirements, said Orcha chief executive Liz Ashall-Payne.
    The firm's reviews help determine whether an app should be recommended to patients by NHS staff.
    There are about 370,000 health-related apps available online, Orcha said.
    App developers can categorise their apps themselves and the ones reviewed by the firm include those tagged health, fitness and medical. So far, the firm has reviewed nearly 5,000 apps and found many poor examples, including:
    A diabetes management app offering complex medical support without any back-up from experts. A physiotherapy app offering exercise plans without any visible input from professionals. An app to help smokers quit, which had not had security updates in more than two years. Read full story
    Source: BBC News, 16 February 2021
  7. Sam
    An average of 10 pre-teen children are admitted to hospital for self-harm each week, it has been revealed, in an apparent doubling of rates.
    Between 2019 and 2020 there were 508 recorded hospital admissions for self-injury, such as cutting oneself, within the 9-12 age group in the UK, compared to 221 between 2013 and 2014, suggesting rates have doubled in the past six years, according to an analysis of the data from BBC Radio 4’s File on 4 programme.
    “The increase in the data that you've looked at is in keeping with what we're finding from our research databases,” Keith Hawton CBE, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Oxford and consultant psychiatrist at Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust, told BBC File on 4.
    Prof Hawton, who is also principal investigator of the multicentre study of self-harm in England, said: “It's almost as though the problem is spreading down the age range somewhat. And I do think it is a concerning problem. And I do think it's important that it's recognised that self-harm can occur in relatively young children, which many people are surprised by."
    Read full story
    Source: The Independent, 16 February 2021
  8. Sam
    A campaign has started to prevent children and young people receiving cancer treatment alone in the pandemic.
    Charities behind the #Hand2Hold campaign want to enable all young people aged 16 to 25 to be allowed a chaperone, instead of only some.
    Mikaela Forrester, 18, from Somerset had some of her cancer treatments alone and said she did not want other young people to have that experience.
    She said without her mother she found it "scary" and "lonely".
    Miss Forrester lives in Frome and was diagnosed in July 2019 with Stage 2 Hodgkin Lymphoma, an uncommon cancer that develops in the lymphatic system. In March 2020 she was told she had relapsed and would need to undergo a further round of chemotherapy, radiotherapy, and a stem cell transplant.
    Because of the coronavirus pandemic, she was told she had to have those treatments on her own, without immediate support from her family or friends.
    She said: "When I had my transplant and my cells harvested with three weeks in hospital, with no visitors, it was just so scary. It was quite lonely."
    "Even if I could hug my parents, or if they could stand two metres away with a mask on, just knowing they were there during the most difficult times would have made me feel comfortable because it was so overwhelming."
    Read full story
    Source: BBC News, 16 February 2021
  9. Sam
    Availability of inpatient child and adolescent mental health services beds — particularly for eating disorders — has reached ‘crisis point’, with young people left waiting on a standard paediatric ward or at home as demand surged during the covid pandemic.
    A report to Surrey Heartlands Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) in January read: “Availability of tier four beds [inpatient mental health beds for children and adolescents, commissioned centrally by NHS England] in the South East and across the country is at crisis point and providers have to compete for the small pool of beds."
    “Waits for beds or being placed far from home is a distressing and unacceptable experience for children and young people and families and places an additional burden on other parts of the system such as paediatric wards.”
    The report noted a “demand upsurge to the highest levels in the last three years” since the pandemic. It stated, in mid-January, the CCG had two patients awaiting eating disorder beds being managed on paediatric wards as they had become “physically too unwell to be managed at home”. Four others also waiting for a CAMHS bed were being managed at home. 
    Read full story
    Source: 16 February 2021
  10. Sam
    The World Health Organization (WHO) has urged countries to prioritise rehabilitation for the medium and long term consequences of covid-19 and to gather information on “long covid” more systematically.
    WHO has produced a standardised form to report clinical data from individual patients after hospital discharge or after their acute illness to examine the medium and long term consequences of COVID-19.1 It has also set up technical working groups to build a consensus on the clinical description of what WHO now calls “the post-covid-19 condition” and to define research priorities.
    Speaking at the first of a series of seminars, WHO’s director general, Tedros Ghebreyesus, highlighted the “three Rs”—recognition, research, and rehabilitation. Recognition of the post-covid-19 condition was now increasing, he said, but still not enough research was carried out. He added that countries needed to show commitment to including rehabilitation as part of their healthcare service. “Long covid has an impact on the individual, on society, and on the economy,” he warned.
    Read full story
    Source: BMJ, 10 February 2021
  11. Sam
    Making maternity wards safer for mothers and babies will need £400m of extra spending every year, hospital leaders have told The Independent.
    They warn that without increased funding, the NHS will not be able to fully implement recommendations made by an inquiry into poor maternity care at the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospitals Trust – where dozens of babies died or were left brain damaged in the largest maternity scandal in NHS history.
    Multiple maternity care failings at hospitals across the country in the past 12 months have sparked concerns over the safety of mothers and their babies with MPs on the Commons Health Select Committee launching an investigation into the issue last year.
    Hospital leaders say even just covering existing shortfalls of 3,000 midwives and recruiting 20 per cent more obstetricians, will cost at least £250m a year. To pay for extra anaesthetists, neonatal nurses and other support staff could push the cost to more than £400m.
    Chris Hopson, chief executive of NHS Providers, which represents hospital trusts, told The Independent that ministers faced a choice of either making the extra cash available or forcing the NHS to cut money elsewhere.
    In a letter to MPs on the committee, Mr Hopson urged them to demand extra funding in its forthcoming report on maternity safety in an effort to force ministers to confront the issue.
    Read full story
    Source: The Independent,9 February 2021,
  12. Sam
    Elective activity levels were significantly lower in January than were achieved before Christmas, according to provisional NHS data seen by HSJ.
    In the three weeks to 20 December, the NHS was reporting around 110,000 day cases and 18,000 ordinary admissions each week. But during January these totals dropped to around 85,000 day cases and 10,000 ordinary admissions per week. This equates to a reduction of 23% and 44%, respectively.
    Regions that were more severely impacted by the third wave of coronavirus saw steeper reductions as covid pressures forced staff working in routine care services to be redeployed.
    In London and the South East, day case activity reduced by around 40 per cent between the same periods, while ordinary admissions fell by around 57%.
    Data for the Christmas fortnight was discounted, as activity always falls dramatically in this period.
    However, the activity levels in January appear to be significantly higher than those reported in the first wave of coronavirus in the spring.
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 10 February 2021
  13. Sam
    Care home staff were without personal protective equipment (PPE) early in the pandemic because the government prioritised the NHS, MPs have said.
    The Commons Public Accounts Committee said care homes received only a fraction of the PPE needed compared with the health service.
    It said social care "was only taken seriously after the high mortality rate in care homes became apparent".
    The government said it worked "tirelessly" to provide PPE.
    The report from the Public Accounts Committee said many healthcare workers were put in an "appalling situation" where they had to care for people with Covid-19 or suspected Covid-19 "without sufficient PPE to protect themselves from infection". It said the social care sector did not receive "anywhere near enough" to meet its needs.
    Health and social care staff suffered PPE shortages, it said, with some forced to reuse single-use items as stocks ran "perilously low".
    Read full story
    Source: BBC News, 10 February 2021
  14. Sam
    A hospital A&E department has been downgraded by regulators amid fears of “significant risk of harm” to patients after inspectors found some were crammed “head to toe” on trolleys during a surge in coronavirus cases.
    The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has told bosses at the Royal Oldham Hospital to urgently improve its A&E service after the November inspection found staff were not following infection rules and patients were at risk of catching the virus.
    The inspection confirms reports, revealed by The Independent last year, that patients in the A&E unit were being forced to wait close together for long periods. Whistleblowers from the trust said the practice was unsafe and the president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, Katherine Henderson, said it was a “potentially lethal” situation.
    The CQC visited the emergency department on 30 November after it said concerns were raised over the safety of patients.
    Read full story
    Source: The Independent, 10 February 2021
  15. Sam
    Despite being one of the world's oldest known medical conditions, public fear and misunderstanding about epilepsy persists, making many people reluctant to talk about it. That reluctance leads to lives lived in the shadows, lack of understanding about individual risk, discrimination in workplaces and communities, and a lack of funding for new therapies research. People with epilepsy die prematurely at a higher rate compared to the general population. The most common cause of death from epilepsy is sudden unexpected death in epilepsy, known as SUDEP. For many people living with epilepsy, the misconceptions and discrimination can be more difficult to overcome than the seizures themselves.
    International Epilepsy Day seeks to raise awareness and educate the general public on the true facts about epilepsy and the urgent need for improved treatment, better care, and greater investment in research.
    hub resources
    Safety advice for people with epilepsy RCPCH: Epilepsy passport Antiepileptic drugs: review of safety of use during pregnancy (MHRA)
  16. Sam
    The NHS’ response to the third wave of the coronavirus pandemic saw the number of whistleblowing concerns raised with the Care Quality Commission (CQC) almost double in December, with the strength of local leadership among the most frequent complaints.
    Many parts of the NHS, particularly in the South East, were suffering major covid pressures in December, and the regulator received 204 whistleblowing concerns, compared to 105 in the same month in 2019.
    The most common complaints were around staffing levels, infection control and leadership.
    The rise in complaints was revealed by CQC chief inspector of hospitals Ted Baker in an interview with HSJ. Professor Baker also said the pandemic had proved that the NHS’ emergency care system lacked “resilience”.
    Trusts which the regulator has received concerns about in recent months have included Liverpool University Hospitals Foundation Trust, over poor staffing levels and infection controls, University Hospitals Birmingham FT, around staffing levels and leadership concerns, and Mid and South Essex FT, over concerns around the provision of oxygen.
    Professor Baker told HSJ: “One of the really positive things that has happened during the pandemic is an increase in the number of people raising concerns with us. It’s been really helpful for us in assessing the risk in the system."
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 8 February 2021
  17. Sam
    Some NHS dental patients have been asked to pay for private care "if they want any treatment", according to a watchdog. Others are facing waits of up to two years for an NHS appointment, Healthwatch England has warned.
    One patient was in so much pain he decided to extract his own teeth, said its chairman Sir Robert Francis QC.
    The NHS said over 650 urgent dental hubs have been set up so patients can access a dentist.
    Hundreds of people contacted Healthwatch England between October and December last year complaining about dentistry issues.
    A briefing document from the watchdog said that "a lack of NHS dentist appointments" remains the most common issue - with people asked to wait for up to two years.
    Read full story
    Source: BBC News, 8 February 2021
  18. Sam
    A trial of an experimental coronavirus vaccine detected the most sobering signal yet that people who have recovered from infections are not completely protected against a variant that originated in South Africa and is spreading rapidly, preliminary data presented this week suggests.
    The finding, though far from conclusive, has potential implications for how the pandemic will be brought under control, underscoring the critical role of vaccination, including for people who have already recovered from infections. Reaching herd immunity — the threshold when enough people achieve protection and the virus can’t seed new outbreaks — will depend on a mass vaccination campaign that has been constrained by limited supply.
    Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, noted that it appears a vaccine is better than natural infection in protecting people, calling it “a big, strong plug to get vaccinated” and a reality check for people who may have assumed that because they have already been infected, they are immune.
    Read full story
    Source: The Washington Post, 6 February 2021
  19. Sam
    The government is planning to reverse reforms of the NHS in England introduced under David Cameron in 2012, a leaked document suggests. 
    The changes would aim to tackle bureaucracy and encourage health services from hospitals to GP surgeries and social care to work more closely. The draft policy paper also says the health secretary would take more direct control over NHS England.
    The reforms by Mr Cameron's government in 2012 saw the creation of NHS England - to run the health service - and the scrapping of primary care trusts in favour of GP-led clinical commissioning groups to organise local services.
    Under the latest proposals, set out in a leaked document published by health news website Health Policy Insight, there will be "enhanced powers of direction for the government" to "ensure that decision makers overseeing the health system at a national level are effectively held to account".
    Instead of a system that requires competitive tendering for contracts - sometimes involving private companies, the NHS and local authorities will be left to run services and told to collaborate with each other, says the draft White Paper, designed to set out proposed legislation.
    There will also be more focus on GPs, hospitals and social care services working together to improve patient care.
    Read full story
    Source: BBC News, 6 February 2021
  20. Sam
    The MP leading an investigation into coronavirus fears Long Covid will be one of the biggest issues facing the UK for the next decade, after emerging research revealed most sufferers are still unable to work six months in.
    Layla Moran branded the scale of the problem ‘enormous’, as various experts warned that even healthy young adults have been left struggling to function for months on end.
    With hundreds of thousands of Brits now believed to have Long Covid, medics fear its impact on the world of work could herald another ‘massive economic crisis’. Workers in their 20s and 30s have told of a host of debilitating symptoms keeping them out of the office for much of last year and making simple tasks like walking to the toilet seem ‘like climbing a mountain’.  
    Speaking exclusively to Metro.co.uk, Ms Moran – who chairs the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on coronavirus – said: "The scale of this, in terms of the future prosperity of our country, is enormous. It is going to be, I think, one of the main issues that we are going to deal with not just in ten years but beyond."
    Read full story
    Source: Metro, 4 February 2021
  21. Sam
    A hospital trust has admitted that ‘medically fit’ patients caught covid on its wards while waiting to be discharged, with some of the cases under investigation.
    Bedfordshire Hospitals FT board papers said that a “number” of medically fit patients “acquired [covid] infection while awaiting appropriate and safe discharge”.
    Trusts nationwide have struggled to discharge patients as quickly as they wanted, the reasons including a Department of Health and Social Care mandate to only allow designated care homes to accept covid patients; the resumption of NHS Continuing Healthcare tests; shortages of community beds; and capacity in the care sector.
    The trust, formed in April by the merger of Luton and Dunstable University Hospital FT and Bedford Hospital FT, said a “significant proportion of [its covid] cases [were] due to acquisition in the hospital”.
    It continued: “A significant additional factor was the length of stay for many patients who were medically fit for discharge but were unable to return to their place of residence. Case reviews have shown that a number of these patients acquired infection while waiting appropriate and safe discharge.”
    The board papers said its covid serious incident reviews covered “some deaths on both sites… and the majority [were] patients with very severe co-morbidity”. It said six out of 15 serious incidents being investigated at its Bedford hospital site were “of potentially avoidable nosocomial covid infection (hospital acquired)”.
    Read full story (paywalled)
    Source: HSJ, 4 Februrary 2021
  22. Sam
    Press release 3 February 2021
    The charity Patient Safety Learning and patient group Long Covid Support are calling for the creation of a dedicated Minister for Long Covid to take a coordinated, multi-stakeholder approach to this issue.[1]
    Long Covid patients are people with confirmed or suspected Covid-19 who continue to struggle with prolonged, debilitating and sometimes severe symptoms months later.[2] Statistics indicate that there are currently hundreds of thousands of people living with Long Covid in the UK, with at least one in 10 people still experiencing symptoms 12 weeks after initial infection.[3]
    While there has been some progress to put in place support for people with Long Covid, there remains a complex spectrum of issues that need to be addressed. These are summarised in a blog, published by Patient Safety Learning and Long Covid Support today, calling for the UK Government to make urgent and significant improvements in their response to Long Covid.[4]
    Claire Hastie of the Long Covid Support, said:
    “Almost one year on from when many first fell ill, people with Long Covid are simply not getting the help they need. There is an urgent need to increase the pace and scale of the response to help the hundreds of thousands of people affected (including children). This needs to be driven by a dedicated minister with the power to affect change.”
    Helen Hughes, Chief Executive of Patient Safety Learning, said:
    “People living with Long Covid have too often been left ‘joining the dots’ trying to understand how they can access safe, quality treatment and support and what they can do to improve their health. Clinical advice and access to further investigations has been inconsistent, leaving many feeling abandoned, confused and understandably concerned for their future health outcomes.
    Long Covid not only impacts people’s physical and mental health, but also their ability to work and their economic circumstances. We believe the appointment of a Minister for Long Covid would help to provide leadership, accountability and a coordinated response to these challenges.”
    Notes to editors:
    [1] Patient Safety Learning is a charity and independent voice for improving patient safety. We harness the knowledge, insights, enthusiasm and commitment of health and social care organisations, professionals and patients for system-wide change and the reduction of avoidable harm.
    [2] The symptoms for those with Long Covid vary greatly but many are experiencing rashes, shortness of breath, neurological and gastrointestinal problems, abnormal temperatures, cardiac symptoms and extreme fatigue.
    [3] Office for National Statistics, The prevalence of Long Covid symptoms and Covid-19 complications, 16 December 2020. https://www.ons.gov.uk/news/statementsandletters/theprevalenceoflongcovidsymptomsandcovid19complications
    [4] Patient Safety Learning and Long Covid Support, Long Covid Minister needed to respond to the growing crisis, 3 February 2020. https://www.patientsafetylearning.org/blog/long-covid-minister-needed-to-respond-to-growing-crisis
  23. Sam
    Only a third of local authorities that are rolling out lateral flow testing have made the test’s limitations clear to the public—including that it does not pick up all cases and that people testing negative could still be infected, an investigation by The BMJ has found.
    A search of the websites of the 114 local authorities rolling out lateral flow testing found that 81 provided information for the public on rapid COVID-19 testing. Of these, nearly half (47%; 38) did not explain the limitations of the tests or make it clear that people needed to continue following the restrictions or safety measures even if they tested negative, as they could still be infected.
    Although 53% (43) did advise people to continue to follow the current measures after a negative result, only 32% (26) were clear about the test’s limitations or its potential for false negatives. The advice the websites gave to the public about a negative test result ranged from “A single negative test is not a passport to carrying on your daily life ‘virus-free’... don’t let a negative COVID-19 test give you a false sense of security” to “It is good news that you don’t have the coronavirus.”
    On 10 January England’s health secretary, Matt Hancock, launched the drive for local authorities to test asymptomatic people who cannot work from home, to try to halt the spread of the virus. But many public health experts are concerned about false reassurance from mass testing.
    Read full story
    Source: BMJ, 26 January 2021
  24. Sam
    Nearly 500 women had to have their cervical smear tests redone after it emerged the nurse who carried them out was not qualified.
    'Dishonest' Alison Watts failed to tell her bosses at an NHS surgery that she failed her course and continued screening women for almost two and a half years.
    When it was discovered Watts had not passed the qualification, 461 women had to be recalled to have the cervix test again so they could have 'quality assured' tests.
    Now Watts has been struck off for the shocking breach of trust, with a tribunal ruling that she put patients at 'significant risk of harm'.
    A Nursing and Midwifery Council [NMC] report said: 'This was not a single instance of misconduct but involved 461 patients over a two year period. There is evidence of sustained dishonesty and deep-seated attitudinal issues.'
    Read full story
    Source: Daily Mail, 26 January 2021
  25. Sam
    New advice on how to treat coronavirus has been issued by the World Health Organisation (WHO) as it also begins a wide-reaching study into the effects of so-called "long COVID".
    For COVID-19 patients at home, WHO is now suggesting the use of a pulse oximetry machine to measure oxygen levels in the blood - but warns that this should only be done after full patient education and with medical follow-up support if necessary.
    For hospitalised patients, WHO is recommending the use of low-dose anticoagulants to prevent clots forming in blood vessels, known as thrombosis.
    And for sufferers who are already using supplemental oxygen, the organisation is officially endorsing the positioning of patients on their stomachs to increase oxygen flow. This is known as "awake prone positioning".
    The new guidelines also include a recommendation that healthcare professionals favour "clinical judgement over models" in making decisions for individual patients.
    Read full story
    Source: Sky News, 26 January 2021
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