A Guide for Use of Chest Imaging by WHO

The World Health Organization published a guide for chest imaging during COVID-19 diagnostics.

This rapid advice guide examines the evidence and makes recommendations for the use of chest imaging in acute care of adult patients with suspected, probable or confirmed COVID-19.

Imaging modalities considered are radiography, computed tomography and ultrasound. This guide addresses the care pathway from presentation of the patient to a health facility to patient discharge.

It considers different levels of disease severity, from asymptomatic individuals to critically ill patients. Accounting for variations in the benefits and harms of chest imaging in different situations, remarks are provided to describe the circumstances under which each recommendation would benefit patients.

The guide also includes implementation considerations for different settings, provides suggestions for impact monitoring and evaluation and identifies knowledge gaps meriting further research.

Download the guide Use of chest imaging in COVID-19 and and also two online annexes providing the results of the evidence review and the GRADE evidence-to-decision tables from the official WHO website.

Translation in Russian and other languages is currently in process.

According to the World Health Organization.