It’s a vast overstatement to say that the COVID-19 crisis has passed, but at this point enough study has been done for the National Institutes of Health to look more deeply into outpatient management, rather than to view every case as imminently life-threatening. The latest update even includes a section entitled Outpatient Management of Acute COVID-19. Read it and you will find recommendations for screening, triage, and therapeutic management of patients with mild-to-moderate COVID-19 who do not require hospitalization—as well as recommendations for postdischarge care of patients who had to be hospitalized. Other updates of note include a new subsection focused on SARS-CoV-2 reinfection in patients who have “recovered” from the virus and another on use of monoclonal antibodies, which has been discussed as a viable treatment to be administered in the urgent care setting. Special considerations for COVID-19 in children, such as treatment decisions, risk factors, and multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children (MIS-C) are also given more attention than they have previously in the guidelines. JUCM published an article on MIS-C from a pediatric urgent care perspective. You can read Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome in Children (Mis-C): Who Should Not Be Misc’ed? online now.
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Update: As the Pandemic Grinds On, NIH Guidelines Become More Urgent Care-Relevant