Implementation of a COVID-19 surveillance programme for healthcare workers in a teaching hospital in an upper-middle-income country

Introduction The reporting of Coronavirus Disease 19 (COVID-19) mortality among healthcare workers highlights their vulnerability in managing the COVID-19 pandemic. Some low- and middleincome countries have highlighted the challenges with COVID-19 testing, such as inadequate capacity, untrained labo...

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Main Authors: Wan, Kim Sui, Tok, Peter Seah Keng, Yoga Ratnam, Kishwen Kanna, Aziz, Nuraini, Isahak, Marzuki, Ahmad Zaki, Rafdzah, Nik Farid, Nik Daliana, Hairi, Noran Naqiah, Rampal, Sanjay, Ng, Chiu Wan, Samsudin, Mohd Fauzy, Venugopal, Vinura, Asyraf, Mohammad, Damanhuri, Narisa Hatun, Doraimuthu, Sanpagavalli, Arumugam, Catherine Thamarai, Marthammuthu, Thaneswaran, Nawawi, Fathhullah Azmie, Baharudin, Faiz, Chong, Diane Woei Quan, Jayaraj, Vivek Jason, Magarita, Venna, Ponnampalavanar, Sasheela, Hasnan, Nazirah, Kamarulzaman, Adeeba, Said, Mas Ayu
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Published: Public Library of Science 2021
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Online Access:http://eprints.um.edu.my/25954/
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0249394
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Institution: Universiti Malaya
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spelling my.um.eprints.259542021-05-07T00:30:26Z http://eprints.um.edu.my/25954/ Implementation of a COVID-19 surveillance programme for healthcare workers in a teaching hospital in an upper-middle-income country Wan, Kim Sui Tok, Peter Seah Keng Yoga Ratnam, Kishwen Kanna Aziz, Nuraini Isahak, Marzuki Ahmad Zaki, Rafdzah Nik Farid, Nik Daliana Hairi, Noran Naqiah Rampal, Sanjay Ng, Chiu Wan Samsudin, Mohd Fauzy Venugopal, Vinura Asyraf, Mohammad Damanhuri, Narisa Hatun Doraimuthu, Sanpagavalli Arumugam, Catherine Thamarai Marthammuthu, Thaneswaran Nawawi, Fathhullah Azmie Baharudin, Faiz Chong, Diane Woei Quan Jayaraj, Vivek Jason Magarita, Venna Ponnampalavanar, Sasheela Hasnan, Nazirah Kamarulzaman, Adeeba Said, Mas Ayu R Medicine Introduction The reporting of Coronavirus Disease 19 (COVID-19) mortality among healthcare workers highlights their vulnerability in managing the COVID-19 pandemic. Some low- and middleincome countries have highlighted the challenges with COVID-19 testing, such as inadequate capacity, untrained laboratory personnel, and inadequate funding. This article describes the components and implementation of a healthcare worker surveillance programme in a designated COVID-19 teaching hospital in Malaysia. In addition, the distribution and characteristics of healthcare workers placed under surveillance are described. Material and methods A COVID-19 healthcare worker surveillance programme was implemented in University Malaya Medical Centre. The programme involved four teams: Contact tracing, risk assessment, surveillance and outbreak investigation. Daily symptom surveillance was conducted over fourteen days for healthcare workers who were assessed to have low-, moderate- and high-risk of contracting COVID-19. A cross-sectional analysis was conducted for data collected over 24 weeks, from the 6th of March 2020 to the 20th of August 2020. Results A total of 1,174 healthcare workers were placed under surveillance. The majority were females (71.6%), aged between 25 and 34 years old (64.7%), were nursing staff (46.9%) and had no comorbidities (88.8%). A total of 70.9% were categorised as low-risk, 25.7% were moderate-risk, and 3.4% were at high risk of contracting COVID-19. One-third (35.2%) were symptomatic, with the sore throat (23.6%), cough (19.8%) and fever (5.0%) being the most commonly reported symptoms. A total of 17 healthcare workers tested positive for COVID-19, with a prevalence of 0.3% among all the healthcare workers. Risk category and presence of symptoms were associated with a positive COVID-19 test (p<0.001). Fever (p<0.001), cough (p = 0.003), shortness of breath (p = 0.015) and sore throat (p = 0.002) were associated with case positivity. Conclusion COVID-19 symptom surveillance and risk-based assessment have merits to be included in a healthcare worker surveillance programme to safeguard the health of the workforce. © 2021 Wan et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Public Library of Science 2021 Article PeerReviewed Wan, Kim Sui and Tok, Peter Seah Keng and Yoga Ratnam, Kishwen Kanna and Aziz, Nuraini and Isahak, Marzuki and Ahmad Zaki, Rafdzah and Nik Farid, Nik Daliana and Hairi, Noran Naqiah and Rampal, Sanjay and Ng, Chiu Wan and Samsudin, Mohd Fauzy and Venugopal, Vinura and Asyraf, Mohammad and Damanhuri, Narisa Hatun and Doraimuthu, Sanpagavalli and Arumugam, Catherine Thamarai and Marthammuthu, Thaneswaran and Nawawi, Fathhullah Azmie and Baharudin, Faiz and Chong, Diane Woei Quan and Jayaraj, Vivek Jason and Magarita, Venna and Ponnampalavanar, Sasheela and Hasnan, Nazirah and Kamarulzaman, Adeeba and Said, Mas Ayu (2021) Implementation of a COVID-19 surveillance programme for healthcare workers in a teaching hospital in an upper-middle-income country. PLoS ONE, 16 (4). e0249394. ISSN 1932-6203 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0249394 doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0249394
institution Universiti Malaya
building UM Library
collection Institutional Repository
continent Asia
country Malaysia
content_provider Universiti Malaya
content_source UM Research Repository
url_provider http://eprints.um.edu.my/
topic R Medicine
spellingShingle R Medicine
Wan, Kim Sui
Tok, Peter Seah Keng
Yoga Ratnam, Kishwen Kanna
Aziz, Nuraini
Isahak, Marzuki
Ahmad Zaki, Rafdzah
Nik Farid, Nik Daliana
Hairi, Noran Naqiah
Rampal, Sanjay
Ng, Chiu Wan
Samsudin, Mohd Fauzy
Venugopal, Vinura
Asyraf, Mohammad
Damanhuri, Narisa Hatun
Doraimuthu, Sanpagavalli
Arumugam, Catherine Thamarai
Marthammuthu, Thaneswaran
Nawawi, Fathhullah Azmie
Baharudin, Faiz
Chong, Diane Woei Quan
Jayaraj, Vivek Jason
Magarita, Venna
Ponnampalavanar, Sasheela
Hasnan, Nazirah
Kamarulzaman, Adeeba
Said, Mas Ayu
Implementation of a COVID-19 surveillance programme for healthcare workers in a teaching hospital in an upper-middle-income country
description Introduction The reporting of Coronavirus Disease 19 (COVID-19) mortality among healthcare workers highlights their vulnerability in managing the COVID-19 pandemic. Some low- and middleincome countries have highlighted the challenges with COVID-19 testing, such as inadequate capacity, untrained laboratory personnel, and inadequate funding. This article describes the components and implementation of a healthcare worker surveillance programme in a designated COVID-19 teaching hospital in Malaysia. In addition, the distribution and characteristics of healthcare workers placed under surveillance are described. Material and methods A COVID-19 healthcare worker surveillance programme was implemented in University Malaya Medical Centre. The programme involved four teams: Contact tracing, risk assessment, surveillance and outbreak investigation. Daily symptom surveillance was conducted over fourteen days for healthcare workers who were assessed to have low-, moderate- and high-risk of contracting COVID-19. A cross-sectional analysis was conducted for data collected over 24 weeks, from the 6th of March 2020 to the 20th of August 2020. Results A total of 1,174 healthcare workers were placed under surveillance. The majority were females (71.6%), aged between 25 and 34 years old (64.7%), were nursing staff (46.9%) and had no comorbidities (88.8%). A total of 70.9% were categorised as low-risk, 25.7% were moderate-risk, and 3.4% were at high risk of contracting COVID-19. One-third (35.2%) were symptomatic, with the sore throat (23.6%), cough (19.8%) and fever (5.0%) being the most commonly reported symptoms. A total of 17 healthcare workers tested positive for COVID-19, with a prevalence of 0.3% among all the healthcare workers. Risk category and presence of symptoms were associated with a positive COVID-19 test (p<0.001). Fever (p<0.001), cough (p = 0.003), shortness of breath (p = 0.015) and sore throat (p = 0.002) were associated with case positivity. Conclusion COVID-19 symptom surveillance and risk-based assessment have merits to be included in a healthcare worker surveillance programme to safeguard the health of the workforce. © 2021 Wan et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
format Article
author Wan, Kim Sui
Tok, Peter Seah Keng
Yoga Ratnam, Kishwen Kanna
Aziz, Nuraini
Isahak, Marzuki
Ahmad Zaki, Rafdzah
Nik Farid, Nik Daliana
Hairi, Noran Naqiah
Rampal, Sanjay
Ng, Chiu Wan
Samsudin, Mohd Fauzy
Venugopal, Vinura
Asyraf, Mohammad
Damanhuri, Narisa Hatun
Doraimuthu, Sanpagavalli
Arumugam, Catherine Thamarai
Marthammuthu, Thaneswaran
Nawawi, Fathhullah Azmie
Baharudin, Faiz
Chong, Diane Woei Quan
Jayaraj, Vivek Jason
Magarita, Venna
Ponnampalavanar, Sasheela
Hasnan, Nazirah
Kamarulzaman, Adeeba
Said, Mas Ayu
author_facet Wan, Kim Sui
Tok, Peter Seah Keng
Yoga Ratnam, Kishwen Kanna
Aziz, Nuraini
Isahak, Marzuki
Ahmad Zaki, Rafdzah
Nik Farid, Nik Daliana
Hairi, Noran Naqiah
Rampal, Sanjay
Ng, Chiu Wan
Samsudin, Mohd Fauzy
Venugopal, Vinura
Asyraf, Mohammad
Damanhuri, Narisa Hatun
Doraimuthu, Sanpagavalli
Arumugam, Catherine Thamarai
Marthammuthu, Thaneswaran
Nawawi, Fathhullah Azmie
Baharudin, Faiz
Chong, Diane Woei Quan
Jayaraj, Vivek Jason
Magarita, Venna
Ponnampalavanar, Sasheela
Hasnan, Nazirah
Kamarulzaman, Adeeba
Said, Mas Ayu
author_sort Wan, Kim Sui
title Implementation of a COVID-19 surveillance programme for healthcare workers in a teaching hospital in an upper-middle-income country
title_short Implementation of a COVID-19 surveillance programme for healthcare workers in a teaching hospital in an upper-middle-income country
title_full Implementation of a COVID-19 surveillance programme for healthcare workers in a teaching hospital in an upper-middle-income country
title_fullStr Implementation of a COVID-19 surveillance programme for healthcare workers in a teaching hospital in an upper-middle-income country
title_full_unstemmed Implementation of a COVID-19 surveillance programme for healthcare workers in a teaching hospital in an upper-middle-income country
title_sort implementation of a covid-19 surveillance programme for healthcare workers in a teaching hospital in an upper-middle-income country
publisher Public Library of Science
publishDate 2021
url http://eprints.um.edu.my/25954/
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0249394
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