OBJECTIVE
To investigate the effectiveness of a daily attestation system used by employees of a multi-institutional academic medical center, which comprised of symptom-screening, self-referrals to the Occupational Health team, and/or a COVID-19 test.
DESIGN
Retrospective cohort study of all employee attestations and COVID-19 tests performed between March and June 2020.
SETTING
A large multi-institutional academic medical center, including both inpatient and ambulatory settings.
PARTICIPANTS
All employees who worked at the study site.
METHODS
Data was combined from the attestation system (COVIDPass), the employee database, and the electronic health records, and was analyzed using descriptive statistics including chi-squared, Wilcoxon, and Kruskal-Wallis tests. We investigated whether an association existed between symptomatic attestations by the employees and them testing positive for COVID-19.
RESULTS
After data linkage and cleaning, there were 2,117,298 attestations submitted by 65,422 employees between March and June 2020. Most attestations were asymptomatic (99.9%). The most commonly reported symptoms were sore throat (910), runny nose (637), and cough (570). Of the 2,026 employees who ever attested symptomatic, 905 employees were tested within 14 days of a symptomatic attestation, and 114 (13%) of these tests were positive. The most common symptoms associated with a positive COVID-19 test were anosmia (23% vs 4%) and fever (46% vs 19%).
CONCLUSIONS
Daily symptom attestations amongst healthcare workers identified a handful of employees with Covid-19. While the number of positives was low, attestations may help keep unwell employees off campus to try to prevent transmissions.