Correspondence on “Clinical practice of gastrointestinal endoscopy in COVID-19 patients: an experience from Indonesia”

Article information

Clin Endosc. 2022;55(4):579-580
Publication date (electronic) : 2022 July 13
doi : https://doi.org/10.5946/ce.2022.081
1Private Academic Consultant, Bangkok, Thailand
2Department of Community Medicine, D Y Patil University, Pune, India
Correspondence: Rujittika Mungmunpuntipantip Private Academic Consultant, Bangkok, Thailand E-mail: rujittika@gmail.com
Received 2022 February 18; Revised 2022 April 14; Accepted 2022 April 15.

To the Editor

We would like to share ideas on the publication of Pribadi et al.1 We agree that adaptation to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is required. According to Pribadi et al.,1 gastrointestinal endoscopy can be safely performed in COVID-19 patients if there is good management. Therefore, the application of specific protocols to prevent COVID-19 is recommended. Undoubtedly, COVID-19 prevention is required in any medical procedure for COVID-19 cases. Infection control has proven to be useful in this scenario.

However, it is necessary to recognize the possibility of asymptomatic COVID-19 cases.2 Recommendations for different degrees of preventative measures for specific cases with known COVID-19 status should be reconsidered. This practice may result in discrimination when performing a medical procedure. There will be more preventive actions if the patient is infected with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2. Consequently, this might easily result in neglect or under-standardized prevention for a case not labeled as a COVID-19 positive. If an asymptomatic COVID-19 case is not diagnosed, a silent spread of the disease can easily occur. During the pandemic, there was no discrimination. The management of any patient should be based on a single standard with universal prevention regardless of COVID-19 status. Specific strategies to execute the recommendation of “no discrimination” include producing updated specific clinical guidelines to match the current rapidly changing scenario of the COVID-19 epidemic. In every practice, all workers must follow the usual universal preventative methods.

Notes

Conflicts of Interest

The authors have no potential conflicts of interest.

Funding

None.

Author Contributions

Conceptualization: RM, VW; Data curation: RM, VW; Validation: RM, VW; Visualization: RM, VW; Writing-original draft: RM, VW; Writingreview& editing: RM, VW.

References

1. Pribadi RR, Utari AP, Muzellina VN, et al. Clinical practice of gastrointestinal endoscopy in COVID-19 patients: an experience from Indonesia. Clin Endosc 2022;55:156–159.
2. Gao Z, Xu Y, Sun C, et al. A systematic review of asymptomatic infections with COVID-19. J Microbiol Immunol Infect 2021;54:12–16.

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