Three attending physicians at the Emergency Department at Stony Brook University Hospital — Adam J. Singer, MD, Eric J. Morley, MD, and Mark C. Henry, MD, from the Department of Emergency Medicine in the Renaissance School of Medicine — have gathered collective guidance, sharing insights and strategic initiatives to address the surge of COVID-19 patients, published online in the New England Journal of Medicine. The paper is entitled “COVID-19 Notes: Staying Ahead of the Wave.”
The Emergency Department at Stony Brook University Hospital saw its first patient with suspected COVID-19 on February 7, 2020. Since then, the hospital has seen more than 3,500 such patients. The paper is intended to help inform clinicians in areas that have not yet been hard hit, to help them prepare for the inevitable “pandemic wave.”
“Persons under investigation for COVID-19 should be treated as if they are infected,” the team advised. “These patients often have a progression of disease severity, with approximately 15% of admitted patients requiring upgrades in care. We hope that lessons from our center will help prepare other physicians and hospitals for what is likely to come so they can stay ahead of the wave.”
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