EMplify by EB Medicine

EMplify by EB Medicine


Episode 38 - COVID-19 Update: An Interview with Andrea Duca, MD

March 19, 2020

COVID-19 Update 03-18-2020 - An interview with Andrea Duca, MD, Emergency Physician in Bergamo, Italy


Time Stamps:


01:29 Dr. Andrea Duca introduction.


02:05 What were your shifts like at the start of the epidemic?


04:50 Were you testing patients for CoOVID-19 initially?


05:08 Were the COVID-19 tests completed in-house or sent out to a government lab?


05:35 The arrival of the first cases. Then… and now.


07:03 What percent of your daily volume is due to COVID-19 patients?


08:17 Are COVID-19 patients diverted to a regional facility?


09:13 Are you still testing patients for COVID-19 today?


09:57 What is your current medication protocol?


10:35 Which antivirals are you currently using?


10:54 Hydroxychloroquine


11:14 Do you use non-invasive ventilation?


13:35 What kind of isolation do you use, airborne or droplet?


14:46 Do you put on new PPE as you go room to room?


15:21 What PPE do you currently use?


15:38 When did you create dirty and clean zones in the emergency department?


16:45 Do you have a dirty and clean side in the waiting room?


17:03 What is your annual emergency department volume? Daily volume?


18:04 How many treatment rooms are in your emergency department?


18:38 What percent of patients are admitted? Do you have borders?


19:54 Where do discharged patients go?


20:14 Have you personally been infected?


20:58 Do you test your staff who are ill? What is your protocol for infected staff?


22:46 What percent of the ED staff were sick at any given time? And inpatient nurses?


24:00 How did you deal with so many inpatient nurses being sick?


24:36 What are your surgeons, who cannot operate, currently doing?


25:35 Are you running out of non-invasive ventilation equipment?


26:20 Summary of current workflow for infected staff.


26:36 How do you use ultrasound for COVID-19 patients in the ED?


29:50 What criteria must a patient meet to be discharged?


31:00 EMS and their role in community screening.


32:20 What are you looking for on ultrasound examination?


34.42 What size chest tube are you utilizing for a pneumothorax in a patient with positive pressure ventilation?


26:33 What inpatient location are patients sent to? By what criteria?


37:05 Have you seen any infected pregnant patients or staff?


38:02 Have you seen any infected children?


38:43 Are you still testing patients? How many times are you testing them?


39:21 What psychological support do you have for staff?


42:25 What would you have liked to know early on, that yo