Table 1.
COVID-19 clinical practice guideline for HD facilities
| Key Recommendations for Dealing with Patients on HD Associated with COVID-19a |
|---|
| Standard, contact, and droplet precautions should be appropriately performed by all patients and health care workers in HD facilities. The waiting room or resting area should be closed, and surgical masks and hand sanitizers should be available and ready for patients to use before entering the HD unit. |
| All patients should check their body temperature and respiratory symptoms before coming to the HD facilities. If they have a fever ≥37.5°C or respiratory symptoms such as dry cough, sore throat, or shortness of breath, they should not visit the HD unit but notify health care workers in advance before visiting the HD facility. |
| A patient with suspected or confirmed COVID-19 should be transferred to a health care facility with an isolation room and portable dialysis machine. The transportation and management plans should be discussed with the public health center and infection control division of the hospital. |
| Close contacts are defined as the patients on HD and health care workers who have been in contact with the patient with a confirmed case. Close contacts should be monitored for body temperature and presence of respiratory symptoms every day. Close contacts without fever or respiratory symptoms should be subjected to self-quarantine and HD with cohort isolation for 14 d from the last exposure. All transport between home and the HD facility should be provided by the disease prevention authority. |
| Interhospital transfer is basically prohibited during outbreak. If referral to another hospital is inevitable, the attending physician should transfer the patients after careful discussion with regional disease prevention authority and the designated hospital. The patient transfer should be performed only when there is solid evidence that the patient is not infected. |
a
Extracted from the Korean clinical practice guidelines for preventing transmission of COVID-19 in hemodialysis facilities.19