HOUSTON – (June 5, 2020) – Researchers at Baylor College of Medicine are recommending that all COVID-19 patients admitted to the ICU undergo a thromboelastography (TEG) to test for the risk of forming blood clots.
“As the surgical critical care team at Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center was discussing their work in the ICU a few weeks ago, I was amazed to hear them express that one of their greatest challenges was that the central intravenous and arterial lines and the dialysis catheters kept unexpectedly clotting in COVID-19 patients in the ICU,” said Dr. Todd Rosengart, chair and professor of the Michael E. DeBakey Department of Surgery at Baylor and senior author of the paper.
Researchers observed 21 patients with confirmed COVID-19 infection admitted to the Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center ICU between March 15 and April 9.
This test showed the researchers two things: the patients who they found were clotting their central intravenous and arterial lines and dialysis catheters had abnormally high clotting function compared to the patients who did not have clotting issues, and the clot breakdown function was significantly higher in the patients who were clotting less than others.
“The TEG test should be performed on all COVID-19 ICU patients immediately to find those who are at a higher risk of clotting,” Rosengart said.
