Investigation of COVID-19 Outbreak in Psychiatric Hospital

Abstract

The Office of Disease Prevention and Control 9, Nakhon Ratchasima (ODPC9) received a notification from the Psychiatric Hospital on January 31, 2022. Subsequently, the Joint Investigation Team (JIT) of ODPC9 started an investigation instantly. The purposes of this study were to confirm the diagnosis and to study the epidemiology of this outbreak; such as to identify type of epidemic, to find contract tracing, to evaluate risk, and to relate the environment in order to introduce preventive and control measures within the area. The study attempted to describe the outbreak including confirmed cases, and close contacts from January 16 to February 28, 2022. The results of this investigation in a ward revealed that there were 45 confirmed cases of COVID-19 that caused an attack rate 55.56%. Most of the patients were male 97.78% whose the median age was 33 years.  The patients were able to report a history of underlying disease 57.78%. Symptomatic patients accounted for 82.22% who had most likely with fever 82.93% and with pneumonia 8.89%. There was no evidence of infection in other wards. The epidemic type illustrated the common source. There was no definite origin of the outbreak, however, the most feasible cause was health care providers and interns who joined activities with the patients 5 days prior to the first reported case. The factor spreading the outbreak was a poor compliance of psychiatric patients due to the nature of the diseases that struggled to follow DMHTT measures. To control this outbreak, the hospital should implement strict measures in terms of screening people who come to visit any patients, relatives, and healthcare workers. In addition, an environmental control and fresh air ventilation should be set properly as well as common contact points should also be disinfected correctly.