Becker's Clinical Quality & Infection Control

36 QUALITY IMPROVEMENT & MEASUREMENT Study: 5 risk factors for long-term COVID-19 By Gabrielle Masson T here are five main risk factors that may increase the chance people experience long-term COVID-19 symptoms, according to research published in the preprint server medRxiv. Researchers at King's College London analyzed data from 4,182 users of the COVID Symptom Study app who had COVID-19 and consis- tently logged health data on the app. The findings had not been peer reviewed as of Oct. 21. Five study findings: 1. Overall, 1 in 20 people with COVID-19 are likely to suffer symptoms for at least eight weeks. 2. "Long COVID" is more likely to affect older people, found in about 10 percent of people ages 18 to 49 testing positive for COVID-19 com- pared to 22 percent of those over 70 years old. 3. Weight also plays a role, with overweight people more likely to report long-term symptoms. 4. Women were more likely to suffer from "long COVID" than men (14.5 percent compared with 9.5 percent), but only in the younger age group. 5. People reporting a wide range of initial symptoms were more likely to develop long-term symptoms, as were people with asthma. n Men more likely to die of COVID-19 than women, analysis finds By Mackenzie Bean T here are 13 deaths among men with confirmed COVID-19 cases for every 10 deaths among women, according to an analysis from Global Health 50/50, an initiative to improve gender equality in global health. The organization analyzed data of more than 5.2 million COVID-19 cases in the U.S., including 194,087 deaths reported through Sept. 30. The analysis found 4.14 percent of men with confirmed cases have died, com- pared to 3.29 percent of women. The disparity exists even with females making up more than half (51.7 percent) of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the U.S., according to AHA News. n ization of echo capture and reporting; education of patients, primary physicians and cardiologists; dedicated coordinator to discuss options with patients and physicians; and heart team evaluation of patients, discussing which patients are for medical therapy, catheter therapy, surgery or palliative care. CardioCare enables the right care of the right patient at the right time. is large comprehensive evaluation provided visibility of our own echo lab metrics and clinical data across the entire Swedish system. is included quantified analysis of protocol measurement adher- ence for aortic stenosis and sonographer compliance. ese metrics are predictors for accurate and early diagnosis of aortic stenosis. Stuart Seides, MD. Physician Executive Director of MedStar Heart & Vascular Institute (Washington, D.C.): MedStar Heart & Vascular Institute at MedStar Washington Hospital Center cared for the largest and sickest group of COVID-19 patients in the region this past spring. Many other heart transplant centers on the East Coast were severely curtailing or ending operations to accommo- date COVID patients, but we knew many patients in need of cardiac transplantation would deteriorate or die if our teams didn't maintain care of these patients. Our advanced heart failure and transplant teams doubled our usual number of transplants, even as many of our MHVI physicians were being redeployed to help care for COVID patients. Maulik Shah, MD. Executive Director of the Cardiovascular Center of Excellence at HonorHealth (Scottsdale, Ariz.): At HonorHealth, our goal is to ensure that every single patient receives the highest quality of care. Within the last year, we've been able to advance our approach to post-heart surgery care to successfully reduce hospital readmissions. First, we aligned all physicians within the HonorHealth Cardiovascular Center of Excellence to make this measure a main area of focus that we, as providers, could all commit to improve. Second, our heart surgeons and cardiologists made a pledge to follow up with all patients within three to seven days aer surgery to address post-surgery questions or concerns more promptly. Finally, to provide a continued focus on follow-up care, we incorporated telehealth technologies as part of our post-surgery follow-up process. By doing this early on, it helped our care team get ahead of the curve with regards to telemedicine prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. Hal Skopicki, MD. Chief of Cardiology and Co-director of the Stony Brook (N.Y.) University Heart Institute: We are initiating a transitional care program with telemonitoring that does not require a physical follow-up appointment to uptitrate guideline-directed medical therapy in patients discharged aer an acute myocardial infarction. n

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