Mild COVID-19 patients can be safely discharged from emergency department: prospective bicentric pilot study

Abstract

Since the end of 2019, a global severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic spread in most countries all over the world. In Italy as in many other countries, admission to acute hospitals was reserved to moderate–severe cases while patients with mild coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) were managed in home isolation. During the last months, several studies have been published regarding prognostication and factors associated with hospital admission of patients with COVID-19 [1–6]. Nevertheless, no prospective studies specifically evaluate the safety of discharge patients from emergency department (ED) using simple criteria to identify mild COVID-19. The aim of our study was to evaluate the rate of readmission or death within 30 days from ED index visit in patients with mild COVID-19 discharged from ED.