Abstract
Background: Understanding the contributing factors for decision-making based on the disease stage
is highly crucial to improving patient care.
Aim: This study aimed to identify the critical and essential factors to enhance clinical decision-making
for COVID-19 patients.
Methods: This mixed-method research was conducted in two phases. In the first phase, a systematic
literature review was performed using defined search strategies across four databases, including
PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science, and IEEE. A total of 136 studies were obtained. Next, a
questionnaire-based survey was conducted to validate the findings from the review and to categorize
the factors into essential and critical factors. The content validity ratio was used to categorize the
factors accordingly. The identified factors were classified into six main categories based on the stages
of care and the corresponding decision-making.
Results: The expert panel consisted of 10 clinicians from various fields. The potential factors were
categorized into six categories. A total of 293 factors were found in the literature review. The findings
of the consensus survey revealed 10 factors related to the decisions on the length of stay, eight factors
for ward referral decisions, one factor for decisions on home referrals, six factors for deterioration
diagnosis decisions, two factors for discharge decisions, and 10 factors for decisions on intensive care
unit referrals. In addition, the study identified respiratory rate, oxygen saturation at administration,
arterial oxygen pressure, sequential organ failure assessment score, and glomerular filtration rate as
significant decision-making factors for COVID-19 patient management.
Conclusion: For medical emergencies (e.g., COVID-19 management), fewer but more significant
factors may increase the efficiency of decision-making, thereby improving the quality of patient
management. On this basis, this study identified the essential and critical factors for decision-making
at different stages of COVID-19 patient management.
Relevance for Patients: This study identified the most important factors in diagnosing the deterioration
of COVID-19 patients to improve the treatment outcome of COVID-19 patients.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.36922/jctr.22.00226
Author affiliation
1Department of Pulmonary and Critical Care, Thoracic Research Center, Imam Khomeini Hospital Complex, Tehran University of Medical Sciences,
Tehran, Iran
2Department of Health Information Management, School of Allied Medical Sciences, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran,
Iran
3Department of Computer Science, Peter L. Reichertz Institute for Medical Informatics, Technical University of Braunschweig, Braunschweig,
Germany
4Department of Biotechnology and Life Sciences, University of Insubria, Varese, Italy
5Department of Health Information Management,
School of Allied Medical Sciences, Kashan University of Medical Science, Kashan, Iran
6Department of Clinical Pharmacy, Faculty of Pharmacy,
Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran
7Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care, Aja University of Medical Sciences, Tehran,
Iran
8Department of Emergency Medicine, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran
*Corresponding authors:
Marsa Gholamzadeh
Department of Health Information Management,
School of Allied Medical Sciences, Tehran
University of Medical Sciences, Fardanesh
Alley, Qods Street, Tehran, Iran.
Email: marsa.gholamzadeh@yahoo.com
Downloads
Full-text PDF
