COVID Risk stratification and Development of Future Healthcare Models [COVID-19]
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Cardio-Respiratory Risk Stratification to Enable Development of Dynamic Healthcare Capacity and Future Therapy Models
IRAS ID
283302
Contact name
Steven Williams
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
King's College London
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 0 months, 0 days
Research summary
Research Summary
This is a retrospective study designed to develop a dynamic model predicting healthcare resource capacity and hospital flow during the COVID crisis and informing the design of future therapies for use in the event of limited resources. Identifying the need and timing of healthcare capacity expansion has been a key challenge in ensuring adequate preparations during the COVID-19 pandemic are available, with the required resources being both under and over-estimated across the country, and indeed the globe. \n\nThis study aims to develop robust healthcare capacity and treatment models to overcome these challenges using retrospective data from a high-volume UK COVID centre to develop future hospital flow models. These models can be used dynamically, estimating patient flow on a day-to-day basis and predicting high capacity and medical resource requirements ahead of time to allow for adaptation to evolving circumstances. Furthermore, specific ventilator data can be used in complex modelling to further develop treatment options such as ventilator splitting for times of greater need with limited resources. [Study relying on COPI notice]
Summary of Results
This study sought to address a topical question arising during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, namely: If there are not enough ventilators, is it possible to ventilate more than one patient on a single ventilator? The results suggest that it is possible, in principle, to estimate individual patient parameters accurately enough, and that a simple set-up delivering similar requirements to both patients can be successful only if patients have the same predicted body weight and respiratory settings. Supporting two patients from a single ventilator is currently untested and the work presented here does not change the current clinical recommendations relating to this approach.
REC name
South Central - Hampshire B Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
20/SC/0292
Date of REC Opinion
30 Jul 2020
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion