DuPage Medical Group Pilots COVID-19 Outpatient Therapeutic Consideration Protocol Using Aspirin & Supplements

DOWN­ERS GROVE, Ill. — Over the last month, DuPage Med­ical Group (DMG) has devel­oped and pilot­ed a new out­pa­tient ther­a­peu­tic con­sid­er­a­tion pro­to­col for COVID-19 patients — which involves aspirin and sup­ple­ments such as vit­a­min D, zinc and iron — to reduce seri­ous com­pli­ca­tions and hospitalizations. 

To devel­op the pro­to­col, a team of DMG physi­cians looked close­ly at what was mak­ing their COVID-19 patients the sick­est — blood clots and inflam­ma­tion. When con­sid­er­ing all med­ica­tions avail­able to treat COVID-19, only blood thin­ners, such as aspirin, and steroids, such as dex­am­etha­sone, had been shown to decrease mortality. 

The vast major­i­ty of those with COVID-19 are treat­ed on an out­pa­tient basis, mean­ing they are treat­ed before reach­ing a hos­pi­tal. With input from infec­tious dis­ease spe­cial­ists, emer­gency room physi­cians, inter­nal med­i­cine and pul­monary crit­i­cal care physi­cians, DMG cre­at­ed an out­pa­tient ther­a­peu­tic con­sid­er­a­tion pro­to­col to sup­port COVID-19 patients ear­ly in their illness.

DMG then pilot­ed the ther­a­peu­tic con­sid­er­a­tion pro­to­col among its high­est risk COVID-19 patients (those with sig­nif­i­cant under­ly­ing med­ical con­di­tions such as emphy­se­ma, con­ges­tive heart fail­ure or mor­bid obe­si­ty) and found that only 10% required hos­pi­tal­iza­tion and 100% made a full recovery. 

“Using this out­pa­tient strat­e­gy allows us to sup­port our COVID-19 patients ear­ly in their ill­ness, before they require hos­pi­tal­iza­tion,” said Dr. Mia Taormi­na, infec­tious dis­ease physi­cian, chair of the infec­tious dis­ease depart­ment at DMG. ​“We have seen suc­cess using these ther­a­peu­tic strate­gies among our high­est risk COVID-19 patients and look for­ward to stan­dard­iz­ing this approach orga­ni­za­tion-wide in the com­ing days.”

Research from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Mary­land School of Med­i­cine indi­cates that COVID-19 patients had few­er com­pli­ca­tions when they took aspirin. As part of the study, COVID-19 patients who were giv­en aspirin ear­ly as an out­pa­tient were 43% less like­ly to be admit­ted to the inten­sive care unit (ICU), 44% less like­ly to be put on a ven­ti­la­tor and 47% less like­ly to die. Fur­ther­more, on Novem­ber 6, the Uni­ver­si­ty of Oxford announced it will add aspirin as a poten­tial treat­ment for COVID-19 as part of a clin­i­cal trial.

“With COVID-19 cas­es surg­ing, there is a lot of con­cern around how chal­leng­ing these next few months will be, before we have a vac­cine,” said Dr. Math­ew Philip, inter­nal med­i­cine physi­cian and Med­ical Direc­tor of Clin­i­cal Inno­va­tion at DMG. ​“The good news is that among our COVID-19 patients, we’re see­ing this pro­to­col make a dra­mat­ic dif­fer­ence in sav­ing lives and help­ing our patients make full recoveries.” 

The ther­a­peu­tic con­sid­er­a­tion pro­to­col was devel­oped by the fol­low­ing DMG physi­cians: Dr. Jonathan Claud (Imme­di­ate Care), Dr. Ravi Nemi­vant (Pul­monary Med­i­cine & Crit­i­cal Care), Dr. Math­ew Philip (Break­Through Care Center/​Internal Med­i­cine), Dr. Ted Shieh (Imme­di­ate Care) and Dr. Mia Taormi­na (Infec­tious Disease). 

DIS­CLAIMER: This ther­a­peu­tic consideration pro­to­col is not being used for pedi­atric patients. If you are expe­ri­enc­ing COVID-19-like symp­toms, con­sult with your pri­ma­ry care provider before tak­ing aspirin or supplements.

About DuPage Med­ical Group 

DuPage Med­ical Group (DMG) is the largest inde­pen­dent, mul­ti-spe­cial­ty physi­cian group in Illi­nois with more than 750 pri­ma­ry care and spe­cial­ty care physi­cians in over 100 sub­ur­ban Chica­go loca­tions. For more than 20 years, DMG has focused on mak­ing health­care bet­ter for its patients and com­mu­ni­ties by offer­ing high qual­i­ty, com­pas­sion­ate health­care. As a physi­cian-led orga­ni­za­tion, DMG’s physi­cians work togeth­er – uti­liz­ing lead­ing-edge tech­nol­o­gy and inno­v­a­tive treat­ment options – to ensure that each patient receives acces­si­ble and effi­cient health­care. For more infor­ma­tion vis­it www​.duly​healthand​care​.com.