Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis to prioritize hospital admission of patients affected by COVID-19 in low-resource settings with hospital-bed shortage.
Int J Infect Dis
; 98: 494-500, 2020 Sep.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-626276
ABSTRACT
OBJECTIVE:
To use Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) to determine weights for eleven criteria in order to prioritize COVID-19 non-critical patients for admission to hospital in healthcare settings with limited resources.METHODS:
The MCDA was applied in two mainsteps:
specification of criteria for prioritizing COVID-19 patients (and levels within each criterion); and determination of weights for the criteria based on experts' knowledge and experience in managing COVID-19 patients, via an online survey. Criteria were selected based on available COVID-19 evidence with a focus on low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).RESULTS:
The most important criteria (mean weights, summing to 100%) are PaO2 (16.3%); peripheral O2 saturation (15.9%); chest X-ray (14.1%); Modified Early Warning Score-MEWS (11.4%); respiratory rate (9.5%); comorbidities (6.5%); living with vulnerable people (6.4%); body mass index (5.6%); duration of symptoms before hospital evaluation (5.4%); CRP (5.1%); and age (3.8%).CONCLUSIONS:
At the beginning of a new pandemic, when evidence for disease predictors is limited or unavailable and effective national contingency plans are difficult to establish, the MCDA prioritization model could play a pivotal role in improving the response of health systems.Keywords
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Patient Admission
/
Pneumonia, Viral
/
Coronavirus Infections
/
Betacoronavirus
/
Hospital Bed Capacity
Type of study:
Diagnostic study
/
Experimental Studies
/
Observational study
/
Prognostic study
Limits:
Adolescent
/
Adult
/
Aged
/
Female
/
Humans
/
Male
/
Middle aged
/
Young adult
Language:
English
Journal:
Int J Infect Dis
Journal subject:
Communicable Diseases
Year:
2020
Document Type:
Article
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