Hospital based contact tracing of COVID-19 patients and health care workers and risk stratification of exposed health care workers during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Eastern India

Abstract

Introduction: Contact tracing and subsequently quarantining of HCWs is essential to minimize further transmission. In this study, we have reported our experience of contact tracing and risk categorization in a tertiary care teaching hospital in Eastern India. Methodology: This is a secondary data analysis of routine data collected from 19th March to 31st August 2020 during the process of contact tracing in a tertiary care teaching hospital in India amongst 3411 health care workers (HCWs). HCWs exposed to COVID-19 infections were categorized as per the risk stratification guidelines and the high risk cases were quarantined for 14 days and tested on 7th day of last contact. The low risk contacts were encouraged to closely monitor their symptoms and allowed to continue work. Results: Out of 3411 contacts 890 (26.1%) were high risk contacts and 2521 (73.9%) were low risk contacts. The test positivity rate of high risk contact was 3.82% and for low risk contact was 1.9%. Number of high risk contacts was more in Non-COVID area (15.84) as compared to COVID area (0.27); p value < 0.001), amongst IPD patients (6.61) as compared to staff (4.02) and OPD (0.22) ; p value = 0.009 and when clustering of cases present (14.35) as compared to isolated cases (8.21); p value < 0.001 Conclusion: The case identification, risk stratification and contact tracing have helped in reducing the number of contacts with due course of time, so preventing the depletion of human resources for continuing health care. The contact tracing approach designed in the current study can also be implemented in other healthcare settings. Key word: COVID-19, contact tracing, health care workers, risk stratification