Simulation as a tool for assessing and evolving your current personal protective equipment: lessons learned during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic

Abstract

[LETTER]. To the Editor, We believe that protection of the well-being of healthcare providers while maintaining a workforce sufficient to respond to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) are fundamental to pandemic planning. In this letter, we describe how our hospital used low-fidelity airway simulation to assess and evolve the personal protective equipment (PPE) used for airway management of patients with COVID-19. We have now had 47 healthcare workers processed through the COVID-19 airway simulation scenario. During the first day of the simulation, we used our facility’s recommended PPE comprising a “yellow gown” (Eden Textile micro fibre isolation gown, Edmonton, AB, Canada), a N95 respirator, a visor integrated into a surgical mask, and non-sterile nitrile gloves. When the practitioners changed the simple face mask to allow bag-mask ventilation during the induction of anesthesia, a patient cough was simulated. [...]