Date: May 9th, 2020

Guest Skeptic: Dr. Sean Moore is an Assistant Professor at the Northern Ontario School of Medicine (NOSM), Chief of Emergency Services at Lake of the Woods Hospital in Kenora, Medical director with Ornge, and Associate Medical Director with CritiCall Ontario.

We had the pleasure of presenting for the Canadian Association of Emergency Physicians (CAEP) COVID-19 Town Hall this week.  CAEP is the national voice of emergency medicine (EM) in Canada and provides continuing medical education, advocates on behalf of emergency physicians and their patients, supports research and strengthens the EM community. In co-operation with other specialties and committees, CAEP also plays a vital role in the development of national standards and clinical guidelines.

Our CAEP COVID-19 Town Hall presentation is available to watch on the CAEP website. It has also been uploaded to CAEP’s YouTube channel. All of the the CAEP COVID-19 Town Halls talks are available free open access. Copies of our slides can be downloaded at this link.

Dr. Moore and I were asked to speak about the treatments being used for COVID-19. In this global pandemic, clinicians and researchers have been throwing multiple different treatments at this new corona virus hoping something will work. This includes things like: Azithromycin, Steroids, Famotidine, IL-6 inhibitors, Chloroquine, Hydroxychloroquine, Remdesivir, Vitamin C, and Zinc.

 

We narrowed our presentation down to five treatments and the evidence behind those treatments. These are listed below with links to the references mentioned in the presentation.

Chloroquine / Hydroxychloroquine

* Gautret et al. Clinical and microbiological effect of a combination of hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin in 80 COVID-19 patients with at least a six-day follow up: A pilot observational study. Travel Med Infect Dis. April 11th, 2020

* Tang et al. Hydroxychloroquine in patients with COVID-19: an open-label, randomized, controlled trial. MedRxIV April 14th, 2020

* Chowdhury et al. A Rapid Systematic Review of Clinical Trials Utilizing  Chloroquine and Hydroxychloroquine as a Treatment for COVID‐19. AEM May 2020.

We cannot recommend hydroxychloroquine or chloroquine based on the available evidence.

Steroids

* Surviving Sepsis Campaign: guidelines on the management of critically ill adults with Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). Intensive Care Med. 2020 Mar 28.

* Wilson et al. COVID‐19: Interim Guidance on Management Pending Empirical Evidence. From an American Thoracic Society‐led International Task Force. Thoracic April 3rd, 2020

* Villar et al. Dexamethasone treatment for the acute respiratory distress syndrome: a multicentre, randomised controlled trial. Lancet Resp Med Feb 7th, 2020

* Wu et al. Risk Factors Associated With Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome and Death in Patients With Coronavirus Disease 2019 Pneumonia in Wuhan, China.