Siaogang Hospital is located at the transportation hub of land, sea and air in South Kaohsiung, and it is inevitable that it should shoulder the responsibility for strengthening the airport epidemic prevention and blocking entry from beyond Taiwan’s borders. The clinical symptoms of the COVID-19 infection are inconsistent, and some carriers are even asymptomatic. Therefore, the transmission of information and the updating of epidemic prevention are very important for the protection of the community.

1. Battling beyond borders epidemic prevention measure : Set up "On-site inspection of Kaohsiung Airport”

2. Kaohsiung Municipal Siaogang Hospital integrates "health system, civil affairs, police agency and campus" establishing cross-field video regional joint defense

3. Siaogang Hospital and SpectroChip promote "The ONE" to build a fast, accurate and cost-saving COVID-19 protective net

Siaogang Hospital has cooperated with the SpectroChip Company to quantify the rapid screening equipment for the coronavirus. There are several advantages in creating a quantitative fast screening machine that leads the world. "Fast": about 10-15 minutes from sampling to fast screening results; "Accurate": the equipment can accurately quantify antibodies (IgG / IgM), and the sensitivity is more than 100 times that of the existing fast screening test, which can exclude most false negatives and false positives; "Wide": palm-sized, easy to carry, which is helpful to expand the detection field; "Real-time": the test results are sent to the cloud database through mobile application, which can immediately grasp the epidemic situation. 

A rapid, inexpensive, and easy-to-use diagnostic device integrated with a smartphone could reduce transportation needs, lower the risk of spreading infection, and mitigate the cost of care for both individuals and the government.

Siaogang Hospital is located at the transportation hub of land, sea and air of South Kaohsiung, and it is inevitable that it should shoulder the responsibility of strengthening the airport epidemic prevention and blocking entry from beyond Taiwan’s borders. The clinical symptoms of the COVID-19 infection are inconsistent, and some carriers are even asymptomatic. Therefore, the transmission of information and the updating of epidemic prevention measures are very important for the protection of the community. The following are some of our achievements during this pandemic.

1. Battling beyond borders epidemic prevention strategy : Set up "On-site inspection of Kaohsiung Airport”

Our hospital is an international airport and port referred hospital by the Centers for Diseases Control, Taiwan. During the epidemic period of COVID-19, patients are diverted according to the travel alert level of the epidemic area. Those with higher risk are transferred to the Kaohsiung Municipal Siaogang Hospital emergency room screening station or other hospitals. The international Kaohsiung airport COVID-19 inspection station carries out the oropharyngeal sampling of symptomatic passengers. This manpower is supported by six medical centers in southern Taiwan, and Siaogang Hospital participated in the initial planning and lent some personal protection equipment to this station. From January 16 to April 23, 2020, a total of 387 persons received COVID-19 sampling in the Kaohsiung Municipal Siaogang Hospital emergency screening station, and one case showed positive. The airport COVID-19 inspection station operated from February 26 to March 17, 2020. A total of 129 persons were sampled and no one showed positive.

2. Kaohsiung Municipal Siaogang Hospital integrates "health system, civil affairs, police agency and campus" establishing cross-field video regional joint defense

The "Community Epidemic Prevention Network" is based on the long-term community network managed by Siaogang Hospital, which is the core concept of regional joint defense. In the regional joint defense system, Siaogang Hospital is categorized into the public health system, which is responsible for providing epidemic prevention measures and health education. Information of epidemic prevention and health education is instantly uploaded to the community network. Civil affairs systems such as district and village offices can use this system to further improve the epidemic prevention measures for serving the public. The police agency includes police precincts and police offices. During daily sobriety tests and inspection, or if epidemic outbreaks happen in the community in the future, the network can provide the police agency with individual information for epidemic prevention, which will greatly improve the security of the implementation of epidemic prevention services. Regarding the campus, through synchronous video conferencing, epidemic prevention education and real-time online consultation can be brought to all teachers and students of Siaogang Health Academy to establish a safe and protective learning environment.

3. Siaogang Hospital and SpectroChip promote "The ONE" to build a fast, accurate and cost-saving COVID-19 protective net

The current COVID-19 diagnostic methods mainly use nucleic acids (RT-PCR), antigen and antibody detection. SpectroChip uses a "synthetic antigen" to detect whether the blood contains antibodies. Siaogang Hospital has cooperated with SpectroChip Company to quantify the rapid screening equipment for the coronavirus. There are several advantages in creating a quantitative fast screening machine that leads the world. "Fast": about 10-15 minutes from sampling to fast screening results; "Accurate": the equipment can accurately quantify antibodies (IgG / IgM), and the sensitivity is more than 100 times that of the existing fast screening test, which can exclude most false negatives and false positives; "Wide": palm-sized, easy to carry, which is helpful to expand the detection field; "Real-time": the test results are sent to the cloud database through the mobile application, which can immediately grasp the epidemic situation. For the follow-ups of suspected patients of COVID19 infection and confirmed patients, rapid screening can help clarify the cause of the disease, reducing the time of inpatient wards and being a reference for whether it is suitable for discharge. In the future, this equipment could be carried out in large-scale medical research and field applications, which will help control the epidemic situation and community prevention to a certain extent.

As the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 rises rapidly throughout the world, more and more patients will require reliable testing. A rapid, inexpensive, and easy-to-use diagnostic device integrated with a smartphone could reduce transportation needs, lower the risk of spreading infection, alleviate the strain on the healthcare system, and mitigate the cost of care for both individuals and the government.