The Role of Fever Clinic During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Case Study of 1034 Febrile Patients
Abstract Background Since winter of 2019, when coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) emerged in China and rapidly spread throughout the entire world, many fever clinics were rearranged and enlarged to triage febrile patients in China.Methods This study included fever clinic visits of Sichuan Provincial Peoples’ Hospital to summarize the characteristics of these febrile patients retrospectively.Results From 24th January to 31th March, 1034 fever clinic visits with 530 male and 504 female, were triaged, treated and recorded. About 64.9% of them were checked with body temperature higher than 37.3℃. Cough (25.0%) and sore throat (19.2%) were the most common symptoms in addition to fever. Chest CT scan was ordered for 900 patients, and 172 cases (16.6%) were found ground grass opacity, 134 (13.0%) found local patchy shadowing, and 26 (2.5%) found bilateral patchy shadowing. At last 851 patients (82.3%) were excluded for COVID-19 or other severe diseases. Eighty patients (7.7%) were admitted to hospitalization for other conditions. One hundred and three (9.9%) patients were suspected or confirmed of COVID-19 at fever clinic, and then admitted to isolation ward.Conclusions The result of this study again verified the extraordinary role of fever clinics in pandemics. When confronted with a mass of unknown febrile patients, a well organized fever clinic may avoid the frustration of all medical staffs.