Skip to main content
International Wound Journal logoLink to International Wound Journal
letter
. 2020 Jun 2;17(5):1534. doi: 10.1111/iwj.13419

N95 respirator, COVID‐19, and health care worker

Viroj Wiwanitkit 1,2,
PMCID: PMC7300853  PMID: 32488933

Dear Editors,

The article on “N95 respirator associated pressure ulcer amongst COVID‐19 health care workers” is very interesting. 1 Lam et al noted that 1 in clinical practice, it is recommended that medical personnel should use protective device regardless of COVID‐19 outbreak. Focusing on complication from using protective device, it is little mentioned in the literature. The pressure ulcer caused by N95 respirator might be due to several reasons including inappropriate wearing, inappropriate respirator size selection, and poor quality of the respiratory. 2 In a study from Indochina, many medical personnel have poor knowledge regarding protective device usage against COVID‐19. 3 To use a respirator, medical personnel should select proper respiratory from standard medical device supplier. Finally, to avoid too long period of wearing that might be related to pressure effect of face, there should be a proper period of practice in contaminated environment. This might be difficult during outbreak but it is necessary to have proper job assignment for medical personnel.

CONFLICT OF INTEREST

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

REFERENCES

  • 1. Lam UN, Md Mydin Siddik NSF, Mohd Yussof SJ, Ibrahim S. N95 respirator associated pressure ulcer amongst COVID‐19 health care workers. Int Wound J. 2020. 10.1111/iwj.13398 (Epub ahead of print). [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  • 2. Bien EA, Gillespie GL, Betcher CA, Thrasher TL, Mingerink DR. Respiratory protection toolkit: providing guidance without changing requirements‐can we make an impact? Workplace Health Saf. 2016;64(12):596‐602. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  • 3. Apaijitt P, Wiwanitkit V. Knowledge of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) by medical personnel in a rural area of Thailand. Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol. 2020. Apr;22:1. 10.1017/ice.2020.159 (Epub ahead of print). [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Articles from International Wound Journal are provided here courtesy of Wiley

RESOURCES