The COVID-19 pandemic seemingly is peaking now in New York City and has triggered significant changes to the standard management of gastrointestinal diseases. a transparent process for how to organize and triage care in the recovery phase will allow for a smooth transition to our new normal. begins to appear in our institutional communications, these patients should be considered among the first group to receive endoscopic evaluation while further prioritizing patients with ongoing symptoms or the need for anticoagulation and/or antiplatelet therapy. Dysphagia, Nausea, Vomiting, and Diarrhea Inpatients or outpatients with symptoms of dysphagia should be assessed for their ability to tolerate sufficient oral intake to maintain proper weight and nutrition. Patients with mild to moderate dysphagia may need to defer evaluation and therapy. Data are lacking for testing, such as esophageal manometry, but given Rabbit polyclonal to ATP5B the prevalence of coughing during intranasal placement, New York City centers have postponed testing. Noninvasive radiographic studies such as barium esophagram may be useful to triage the need for endoscopy, however, the local availability of radiology services and department policies will need to be considered as well. We have found CK-1827452 inhibitor database that very few patients have been sent for timed contrast studies for any indication. Consensus indications for prompt endoscopy include an failure to tolerate a sufficient liquid diet with ongoing dehydration/profound weight loss or foreign body or food impaction with an failure to tolerate secretions after intravenous glucagon has failed.9 Options CK-1827452 inhibitor database for nutritional management of patients with dysphagia are discussed later. CK-1827452 inhibitor database COVID-19 can present with nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea, and these can predate respiratory symptoms. In a recent statement, up to 61% of outpatients who tested positive for COVID-19 experienced these GI symptoms.10 During the peak of the epidemic, acute nausea, vomiting, or diarrhea should be considered COVID-related until confirmed otherwise. Outpatients should self-quarantine and minimize exposure to household contacts. For all those inpatients and ongoing symptoms in outpatients, GI pathogen screening including should be considered, particularly in patients with signs such as leukocytosis or those with risk factors such as recent antibiotic use. In the absence of a bacterial pathogen, medical management with anti-emetics and antidiarrheals (eg, loperamide) can be optimized. Careful monitoring of the QTc is essential because many anti-emetics prolong the QT, particularly when combined with other agents being used for COVID-19 that also impact the QTc (hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin). Some institutions have hospital-wide protocols in place to monitor the QTc and reduce risk of Torsades de pointes. Special circumstances may lower the threshold for endoscopic evaluation for nausea, vomiting, or diarrhea. This includes evaluation for graft-versus-host disease in bone marrow transplant patients and for immune-mediated colitis in patients receiving checkpoint inhibitors. If an infectious work-up is usually unrevealing and patients remain symptomatic after maximizing medical therapy, patients should proceed to endoscopy in efforts to avoid empiric immunosuppression. Enteral Diet and Gain access to Consults for gastrostomy positioning have got reduced across establishments in NY significantly, with less than one to two 2 referrals weekly for percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy according to a recently available New YorkCbased study.6 Although extended intubation warrants gastrostomy positioning, it’s possible the fact that high associated mortality rate, and need to decrease invasive, aerosolizing methods CK-1827452 inhibitor database in COVID-19Cinfected individuals, has resulted in infrequent gastrostomy placement. The timing and method of gastrostomy placement should be mainly individualized towards the providers and resources offered by a particular area. It is strongly recommended to bring every one of the procedural providers that place nourishing pipes, along with ICU administration, to determine a workflow together. Within the brand new York City region, most gastrostomies in sufferers examining positive for COVID-19 are getting positioned by interventional radiology, if the individual already includes a NGT set up specifically. Finding the optimum timing for gastrostomy positioning in CK-1827452 inhibitor database COVID-positive sufferers is crucial and must consider the basic safety of staff using the associated prospect of serious adverse occasions, such as.