. Ahmad AbdulAzeem Abdullah Omer
Volume 11, Issue 9 , October 2021, , Pages 1-8
Abstract
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‑19) is a serious global pandemic that has extremely affectedhealth‑care systems. This article aimed to review the perspectives of general surgical ...
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The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‑19) is a serious global pandemic that has extremely affectedhealth‑care systems. This article aimed to review the perspectives of general surgical practice duringthe COVID‑19 pandemic. A systematic review of the literature addressing modification to generalsurgical practice during the COVID‑19 pandemic indexed in PubMed, Scopus, Google, and Googlescholar was carried out on June 19–20, 2020. The literature review yielded 577 articles. The exclusionof duplication, articles not in English, and specialized ones in various surgical disciplines precluded398 articles. Finally, following checking for relevance and publication status, 114 papers were included.Recommendations for surgical practice during the COVID‑19 pandemic revolved around mitigationof the risk of virus transmission to patients and health‑care workers. The emerging themes of safetyprecautions were related to patient prioritization and testing, mindful consideration of the operativestrategy, optimum use of personal protective equipment, operative room setup, and departmentalorganization. However, those recommendations were often diverging and bore on a dearth ofevidence and personal opinions. Multidisciplinary work and cooperation among surgical specialtiesare required to establish and validate the protocols for safe surgical practice during the pandemicand perhaps similar crises in future. The COVID‑19 pandemic has brought several challenges tothe field of medicine, including the surgical specialty. The centrality of safety precautions emergingin this crisis requires surgeons to adopt the new roles and work standards and translate them intopractice during the pandemic and perhaps longer.
