Karnataka revises Covid-19 patients’ discharge rules
Bengaluru: The Karnataka Health Department has revised rules on the discharge of Covid-19 patients, mandating that asymptomatic patients can be released in case of no fever, saturation above 95 per cent and respiratory rate less than 24 per minute, said an official on Wednesday.
“Asymptomatic individuals with corona positive report, who continue to remain asymptomatic during hospital stay, shall be discharged 10 days after the positive test,” said Additional Chief Secretary Jawaid Akhtar.
Similarly, there is no requirement for an RT-PCR, CBNAAT or True-NAT test for an asymptomatic case before discharge but will be advised home-quarantine and self-monitoring for a fortnight.
In case of mild and moderate cases, the patient should not exhibit any symptoms such as fever for three days before discharge, without using antipyretics.
They should also maintain saturation above 95 per cent for four consecutive days before discharge without oxygen support. Breathlessness, clinical signs and symptoms should also be resolved.
“Repeat inflammatory markers (S. Ferritin, S. LDH, D-Dimer and CRP) at the time of discharge. These should be in normal range and decreasing trend,” said Akhtar.
A mild or moderate case can be discharged 10 days after the onset of symptoms after meeting the explained parameters and can extend up to 17 days depending on the health condition.
In severe cases, including immunity compromised HIV patients, organ transplant recipients and malignancy cases, the patients shall be discharged only after complete clinical recovery.
Such patients should also not have fever for three consecutive days before discharge, without using antipyretics.
They also have to maintain saturation above 95 per cent for the last four days before discharge without oxygen support. The issues of breathlessness, clinical signs and symptoms also need to be resolved.
Similar to mild and moderate cases, inflammatory markers (S. Ferritin, S. LDH, D-Dimer and CRP) should be repeated at the time of discharge. These should be in normal range and decreasing trend
“One RT-PCR, CBNAAT and True-NAT test should be done three days after complete clinical recovery and the patient should be discharged if the report is negative,” said Akhtar.
In the event of positive report, the swab test shall be repeated after 72 hours.
At the time of discharge, all asymptomatic, mild, moderate and severe cases should be advised home-quarantine and self-monitoring of health for a fortnight.
Likewise, all cases have to undergo regular temperature and pulse oximetry checks.
