Based on a study involving more than 500 crew members

"Intensive care" doctors are less likely than their colleagues to contract "Covid-19"

The "intensive care" doctors are equipped with highly protective equipment.

Archives

A British study revealed that doctors working in "intensive care" are, despite their handling of the most serious cases, less likely to contract Corona virus than their colleagues in other departments, or even from hospital maintenance workers.

The matter may be attributed, in part, to providing them with preventive equipment to a large extent, such as: masks, according to what the authors of this study explained, the details of which were published in the medical journal "Thorax".

"We used to think that those working in intensive care departments face a higher risk ... but they are well protected relative to others," said Alex Richter, a professor of epidemiology at the University of Birmingham, who supervised this research.

The study included more than 500 medical personnel in Birmingham hospitals, all of whom were practicing their duties in late April, when the epidemic intensified in Britain, when general isolation was imposed.

At that time, hospitals were treating the equivalent of five patients with "Covid-19", per hour.

And conducted for the participants in this research a serological examination (for antibodies), to see if they had been previously infected with the infection.

And it was found that 24% of the participants had antibodies, indicating a previous infection with the Coronavirus, compared to 6% of the total population of this region.

However, this percentage differed according to the medical staff, as it was the lowest for (intensive care) doctors, 15%, compared to 30% for workers in general medicine services, and 34.5% for maintenance workers.

In addition to the equipment issue, this may be due to the fact that "intensive care" specialists have entrusted the application of strict infection prevention measures, according to Tim Cook, professor of anesthesiology at the University of Bristol.

He also explained that this percentage is low, by saying that the probability of transmitting the infection is lower in patients who are infected with dangerous stages, and then advanced from the disease, than for those who have recently been infected with the virus.

Follow our latest local and sports news, and the latest political and economic developments via Google news