Article Sidebar
Published:
Apr 25, 2022DOI:
10.4314/aas.v18i4.3Keywords:
Article Details
Authors submitting articles to The Annals of African Surgery do so on the understanding that if accepted, they will retain the copyright and allow the journal to publish and archive the article under the CC BY (Creative Commons Attribution License) 4.0 International. See details on the Creative commons website. All authors will be required to sign an Author Agreement form detailing the agreement with the journal prior to the article being published. Download the form here
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Main Article Content
Surgery of COVID-19-infected patients in Africa: A scoping review
Franck Katembo Sikakulya
Abstract
Objective: The aim of this scoping review was to highlight the nature and scope of research and
publications about surgery in COVID-19-infected patients in Africa in order to inform guidelines
applicable in Africa. Methods: We considered peerreviewed and gray literature from PubMed, Google Scholar, and Word Health Organization COVID-19 online databases published from February 1, 2020, to February 28, 2021, about surgery for/in COVID-19-infected patients. The review is reported using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analysis extension for Scoping Reviews. Results: Of 530 studies screened, only 11 (2.08%) were found
eligible, including 4 cohort studies, 3 cross-sectional studies, 2 letters to the editor, 1 case series, and 1 review. The key emphasis areas by the eligible studies were vaccination, testing prior to surgery, clinical guidelines to reduce complications related to COVID-19 among infected patients, and protection of the surgical team. Conclusion: There is a dearth of studies on surgery in COVID-19-infected patients in Africa. There is an urgent need for more reports and publications from the African experiences so as to inform contextualized guidelines for surgical care in low-resource settings during the COVID-19 pandemic.
