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Death rates have dropped significantly in critically ill #COVID19 patients.
[1] Survival rates have improved with medical advances and less crowded hospitals.
England study of 15,000 patients showed that survival improved by about 10% each week after March end for patients in critical care/ ICU.
[2] Death rates dropped significantly from 25.6% (March) to 7.6% (August).
[3] Doctor related factors:
Doctors understand the disease and the treatments better now.
a. At first, the focus was on the lungs; now, other organs are monitored too.
b. Doctors now know how to watch for oxygen levels even before patients are in the hospital
c. Doctors now know when people need to be on ventilators and when they don’t. Use of mechanical ventilation has come down drastically. Proning with supplemental oxygenation is working very well.
d. Doctors also weren’t aware of life-threatening blood clots. Now patients are put on blood thinners early on in treatment when necessary.
e. Earlier recommendation was not to use steroids. (Recommendations from Italy & China). But, now doctors use steroids very effectively.
[4] Patient related factors:
With increased community awareness, patients are seeking care earlier in the course of their illness.
(Early detection saves lives. Watch ABC protocol: https://youtu.be/GxKJSCaUsZA)
[5] Hospital related factors:
Outcomes may also have improved as the load on hospitals lightened and there was less pressure on the medical staff, both of which had been overwhelmed by a surge of patients in the spring.
[6] Virus related factors:
#SARSCoV2 has become more easily transmissible, but there is no solid evidence that it has become either less virulent, or more virulent.
[7] Current concerns:
a. Long Covid still remains a concern.
b. Increasing number of cases during winter may reverse the gains by increasing the load on hospitals once again.
Link: NYT, 29 Oct 2020
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/29/health/Covid-survival-rates.html
