As many as 5,654 persons infected with mild forms of COVID-19 receive treatment at home. Meetings and training seminars with family doctors were held last week to teach them how to implement the new provisions of the temporary COVID-19 protocol, IPN reports.

As of April 10, 17,370 persons have been confirmed with COVID-19 and 10,374 persons completed home treatment, while 1,333 were admitted to hospitals.

“In the current situation, the role of family doctors is essential as they are involved in the testing and also in the treatment and supervision of patients infected with COVID-19, who receive treatment at home. They also continue to provide medical services, such as immunization, supervision of children and pregnant women and persons with chronic diseases, and do prophylactic medical examinations,” Minister of Health, Labor and Social Protection Viorica Dumbrăveanu stated in the meeting of the National Focal Point.

The family doctors and nurses take samples from patients receiving treatment at home in accordance with the guidelines and trainings of the Ministry of Health and decide treatment for them depending on the results.

New provisions were added to the temporary COVID-19 protocol on August 25. This way, the patients who were discharged from the hospital or excluded from home treatment will not self-isolate for 14 days as the WHO and the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control determined the persons who got the infection are no longer contagious after ten days of disease.

The discharge or the exclusion from home treatment of asymptomatic persons will take place in ten days of the positive test, without rerunning the test for negative confirmation. After this, self-isolation will no longer be necessary.

Testing on discharge will be performed only for adults admitted to the hospital with serious forms of COVID-19, for children hospitalized with confirmed pneumonias and severe forms of the disease and for children younger than seven.