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In an online sample of 1054 Italian community-dwelling adults, we assessed the relationships between the frequency of implementation of practices intended to prevent COVID-19 infection, degree of agreement with theories about the origin of the infections, and the frequency of use of different sources of information concerning the COVID-19 pandemic. The results showed that participants' COVID-19-related preventive behaviors and causal beliefs were significantly associated with selected demographic variables and frequency of use of specific sources of information (e.g. scientific journals vs social media). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the COVID-19 era the real challenge for the Emergency Departments (ED) is to avoid the spread of the viral infection within the so called “clean area” of the emergency room and the hospital. Different protocols have been proposed and adopted in the EDs to quickly identify suspected COVID-19 patients and to correctly manage these patients, all based on clinical and epidemiological criteria. To the best of our knowledge, our pre-triage decisional making-process first integrates the pre-triage interview with pointof- care Lung Ultrasound (LUS) performed in the triage area. The aim of our study is to assess the sensitivity and specificity of our screening clinical and/or epidemiological criteria, and to investigate the role of LUS in the triage decision-making process during the “phase 2” of the COVID-19 Italian epidemic. Our study confirms the pivotal role of the triage in the decision-making process and the management of the entire ED, and it demonstrates that further studies are necessary to validate the role of LUS as tool to promptly identify COVID-19 patients, if combined with a correct pre-triage interview.

In Northern Italy the coronavirus infection has spread since February 2020: the increase in admissions of COVID-19 patients corresponded to a drastic decrease in admissions of regular patients to the Emergency Room (ER). This retrospective study was conducted by Academy of Emergency Medicine and Care (AcEMC). During the lockdown period the accesses were reduced by more than 50%, and in the following months of May and June 2020, there was a recovery clearly below (70%) previous year’s numbers. We have observed a drastic reduction in white and green codes, a fair reduction in yellow codes, while red codes remained stable. The decrease in access to the ER mainly concerned patients with low priority color codes, but also the reduction in the number of accesses of yellow and red codes, insignificant at a superficial glance, is notable. If we consider that yellow and red codes during the months of the lockdown included many patients with COVIDrelated respiratory insufficiency, it is evident that there was a clear reduction in the number of serious illnesses not COVID-related. This is certainly another serious consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In the COVID-19 era the real challenge for the Emergency Departments (ED) is to avoid the spread of the viral infection within the so called "clean area" of the emergency room and the hospital. Different protocols have been proposed and adopted in the EDs to quickly identify suspected COVID-19 patients and to correctly manage these patients, all based on clinical and epidemiological criteria. To the best of our knowledge, our pre-triage decisional making-process first integrates the pre-triage interview with point-of-care Lung Ultrasound (LUS) performed in the triage area. The aim of our study is to assess the sensitivity and specificity of our screening clinical and/or epidemiological criteria, and to investigate the role of LUS in the triage decision-making process during the "phase 2" of the COVID-19 Italian epidemic. Our study confirms the pivotal role of the triage in the decision-making process and the management of the entire ED, and it demonstrates that further studies are necessary to validate the role of LUS as tool to promptly identify COVID-19 patients, if combined with a correct pre-triage interview. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Northern Italy the coronavirus infection has spread since February 2020: the increase in admissions of COVID-19 patients corresponded to a drastic decrease in admissions of regular patients to the Emergency Room (ER). This retrospective study was conducted by Academy of Emergency Medicine and Care (AcEMC). During the lockdown period the accesses were reduced by more than 50%, and in the following months of May and June 2020, there was a recovery clearly below (70%) previous year's numbers. We have observed a drastic reduction in white and green codes, a fair reduction in yellow codes, while red codes remained stable. The decrease in access to the ER mainly concerned patients with low priority color codes, but also the reduction in the number of accesses of yellow and red codes, insignificant at a superficial glance, is notable. If we consider that yellow and red codes during the months of the lockdown included many patients with COVIDrelated respiratory insufficiency, it is evident that there was a clear reduction in the number of serious illnesses not COVID-related. This is certainly another serious consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• COVID19 patients can develop severe acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). • ARDS is a fatal complication and the most common cause of death in COVID19 patients. • Early detection of acute respiratory failure is mandatory to promplty identify critically ill COVID19 patients. • Elevated LDH and CRP serum concentrations are associated to respiratory failure in CoVID-19 patients. The dramatic worldwide CoVID-19 infection requires the identification of a reliable and inexpensive tool to quickly discriminate patients with a more unfavorable outcome. We performed routine laboratory tests suitable to identify tissue damage and inflammatory status in 123 consecutive CoVID-19 patients admitted to the Emergency Department of the hospital of Piacenza (Emilia-Romagna, Northern Italy). The results were correlated with patients' respiratory function evaluated by the partial pressure of arterial oxygen to fraction of inspired oxygen ratio (PaO2/FiO2). The most common laboratory abnormalities were lymphocytopenia and elevated values of C-reactive protein (CRP) and lactate dehydrogenase (LDH). Aspartate aminotransferase (AST), alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and creatine kinase (CK) were also increased. The respiratory performance (PaO2/FiO2) showed a strong inverse correlation with LDH (r = 0.62, r2 0.38, p value < 0.0001) and CRP (r = 0.55, r2 0.31, p value < 0.0001). PaO2/FiO2 values also showed a significant inverse correlation with age (r = −0.37, p < 0.0001), AST (r = −0.31, p < 0.01), WBC (r = −0.49, p < 0.0001), neutrophils count (r = −0.5, p < 0.001). ROC curves showed a sensitivity of 75% and specificity of 70% for the LDH cut-off value of 450 U/L and a sensitivity of 72% and specificity of 71% for the CRP cut-off value of 11 mg/dl in identifying CoVID-19 with moderate-severe ARDS. LDH and CRP may be related to respiratory function (PaO2/FiO2) and be a predictor of respiratory failure in CoVID-19 patients. LDH and CRP should be considered a useful test for the early identification of patients who require closer respiratory monitoring and more aggressive supportive therapies to avoid poor prognosis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]