0000000000258029
AUTHOR
Marilaeta Cindryani
Elective surgery system strengthening: development, measurement, and validation of the surgical preparedness index across 1632 hospitals in 119 countries
© 2022 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an Open Access article under the CC BY 4.0 licenseBackground: The 2015 Lancet Commission on global surgery identified surgery and anaesthesia as indispensable parts of holistic health-care systems. However, COVID-19 exposed the fragility of planned surgical services around the world, which have also been neglected in pandemic recovery planning. This study aimed to develop and validate a novel index to support local elective surgical system strengthening and address growing backlogs. Methods: First, we performed an international consultation through a four-stage consensus process to develop a multidomain index for hospital-level assess…
Variation in communication and family visiting policies in intensive care within and between countries during the Covid-19 pandemic: The COVISIT international survey
Background: During the COVID-19 pandemic, intensive care units (ICU) introduced restrictions to in-person family visiting to safeguard patients, healthcare personnel, and visitors. Methods: We conducted a web-based survey (March– July 2021) investigating ICU visiting practices before the pandemic, at peak COVID-19 ICU admissions, and at the time of survey response. We sought data on visiting pol icies and communication modes including use of virtual visiting (videoconferencing). Results: We obtained 667 valid responses representing ICUs in all continents. Before the pandemic, 20% (106/ 525) had unrestricted visiting hours ; 6% (30/525) did not allow in-person visiting. At peak, 84% (558/667…