Risk of COVID-19 Transmission from Infected Outpatients to Healthcare Workers in an Outpatient Clinic.

Risk of COVID-19 Transmission from Infected Outpatients to Healthcare Workers in an Outpatient Clinic. J Korean Med Sci. 2020 Dec 28;35(50):e431 Authors: Chung H, Kim EO, Kim SH, Jung J Abstract From January to September 2020, we conducted contact-tracing for confirmed coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients who visited our outpatient clinic to evaluate the risk of COVID-19 transmission from infected patients to healthcare workers (HCWs). COVID-19 was diagnosed in 8 outpatients. Per the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) polymerase chain reaction test results, none of the 317 HCWs who came in contact had a confirmed COVID-19 diagnosis (0.00%; 95% confidence interval, 0.00%-0.01%). This low rate of transmission from infected outpatients to HCWs suggests that standard precaution such as using surgical mask and hand hygiene protects HCWs from SARS-CoV-2 in a low-risk, outpatient clinic setting. PMID: 33372425 [PubMed - in process]
Source: J Korean Med Sci - Category: General Medicine Authors: Tags: J Korean Med Sci Source Type: research