Shanghai going all out to treat severe COVID-19 cases

SHANGHAI -- At the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center, elderly COVID-19 patients are receiving careful treatment, with indexes such as heart rate, blood pressure, and respiration monitored around the clock.

"We adopted an individualized strategy both in treatment and nursing, which can help the elderly patients recover faster," said doctor Liu Chenghao.

Liu is a member of a medical team fighting COVID-19 at the center. The team has just saved the life of a senior patient with a history of lung cancer who was in a fatal situation, he said.

Medical personnel in Shanghai are making every effort to ensure the proper treatment of severely ill patients to reduce the fatality rate of COVID-19.

Zhang Boli, an academician with the Chinese Academy of Engineering, said people aged over 60 accounted for 30 percent of the confirmed cases in Shanghai. Most of these elderly suffer from underlying diseases, including hypertension, diabetes, coronary heart disease, Alzheimer's disease, cancer, and uremia.

"A combination of these problems and COVID-19 can lead to severe, rapidly-progressing disease that can easily turn into severe and critical illness," he said.

Zhang said it is vital to distinguish the high-risk groups and pay attention to the development of their underlying diseases. He also called for an individualized strategy, a multidisciplinary approach, early intervention, and integration of traditional Chinese and western medicines to treat severe cases.

Wang Xingpeng, director of Shanghai Shen Kang Hospital Development Center, said nine medical teams have been dispatched to eight designated hospitals to treat severe COVID-19 cases. They are composed of over 360 experts with rich intensive care experience.

The city has also established a treatment mechanism featuring early monitoring and early intervention for critically ill patients. The municipal-level designated hospitals have been promoting individualized treatment and multidisciplinary consultations, Wang said.

Working side by side with Shanghai medical staff, medical teams from different provinces nationwide are also on the front line of treating critical cases.

"For the elderly patients with underlying diseases, doctors should keep an eye on the changes in their condition," said Xu Min, from the Second Xiangya Hospital of Central South University in Hunan Province.

"We have various advanced equipment to treat critically ill patients with serious heart and lung function damage," he said. "We will do our best to treat the seriously ill, reduce the death rate, and raise the cure rate."