Cuba’s public health system has developed an action protocol for treatment of recuperating COVID-19 patients, designed to ensure follow-up assistance from medical institutions for all who have recovered from the disease, during the first year after being discharged from the hospital.
Dr. Emilio Fidel Buchaca Faxas, president of the Cuban Internal Medicine Society, explained that attention to convalescents begins at the primary care level, continuing in specific health institutions and the community through a Basic Work Group which includes psychologists, pediatricians, internists, geriatricians, gynecologists, obstetricians, epidemiologists and rehabilitation specialists, according to the Ministry of Public Health website.
Dr. Buchaca reported that health authorities have organized the provision of inter-consultations with a variety of specialists at the primary level, so that referrals to secondary and tertiary institutions can be made during the initial evaluation.
If a specialized consultation is required at the secondary or tertiary level, municipal and provincial health commissions are responsible for guiding patients, to ensure treatment of transitory or long-term complications that may appear, be they of a respiratory, cardiovascular, neurological, nephrological or digestive nature, he said.
(Taken from Granma)