Specific Management of Patients with Acute Abdomen during the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Surgical Perspective from Germany

During the current COVID-19 pandemic, the triage, assessment, and management of patients presenting to the emergency department with critical conditions has become -challenging The clinical features of COVID-19 are heterogeneous and subtle in many cases They may easily be overlooked in the case of other acute diseases Gastrointestinal symptoms are common in patients with COVID-19 as SARS-CoV-2 is able to enter gastrointestinal epithelial cells However, these complaints can also be caused by a COVID-19-independent concomitant abdominal pathology Therefore, patients with acute abdominal pain and fever need to be assessed very thoroughly Based on a clinical case, we present our approach of managing emergency patients with acute abdomen and concomitant suspicion of -COVID-19 Copyright � 2020