The Prevalence and Clinical Characteristics of the Healthcare Workers Infected with SARS Cov-2 in Baqubah Teaching Hospital, Diyala-Iraq

Abstract

Background: In 2019, a novel coronavirus was identified. It first appeared in Wuhan, China and caused a cluster of pneumonia cases. The virus was named severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). The World Health Organization designated the disease COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019). Objective: To find the prevalence of COVID-19 infection among symptomatic frontline and non-frontline healthcare workers, their main complaint and clinical outcomes. Patients and Methods: This is a cross sectional study done on retrospective data in which all symptomatic healthcare workers in Baqubah teaching hospital were involved in the study and full questionnaire forms were filled. Nasal and throat swabs were taken for polymerase chain reaction test and high-resolution computed tomography were done. Results: From (1413) symptomatic healthcare workers tested for COVID-19 (185) were positive yielding a (13%) prevalence from the total employed healthcare workers in Baqubah teaching hospital, with (63%) were male. Most of the affected were nurses (63.2%) ,(59.5%) of the affected healthcare workers were non-frontline staff. Fever was the most common symptom and was seen in(79.5%) followed by shortness of breath in(63.8%).The disease course was mild in (83.8%) of the affected healthcare workers and only (2.7%) need admission to the hospital and the mortality rate was (0.5%). Conclusion: Most infections among healthcare workers occurred during the last two months of the disease outbreak. The prevalence of the COVID-19 infection among our healthcare workers was high and mostly in non–frontlie staff. Rapid identification of staff with potential infection and routine screening among asymptomatic staff could help protect other healthcare workers.