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When the National Board of Health and Welfare sent out guidelines in April on how patients dying from COVID-19 should be treated, they were clear that oxygen would be used in the event of severe oxygen deficiency.
“Try oxygen therapy, especially with oxygenation below 90 percent.”
After several query responses noted that oxygen is not available in nursing homes, the wording became more vague:
“Try oxygen if necessary, but remove oxygen if symptoms have not relieved within an hour.”
Lack of oxygen affects patients with covid-19, without shortness of breath
Lack of oxygen can be experienced before death in covid patients, even if they do not have it. In those cases, oxygen doesn’t help.
However, doctors around the world have warned about the so-called “silent hypoxia” in patients with covid-19. The phenomenon means that people can suffer from severe oxygen deficiency, without presenting symptoms such as shortness of breath.
In Norway, this has led to nursing homes being equipped with oxygen. The World Health Organization (WHO) also believes that oxygen is one of the drugs that should be available.
In Sweden, the patterns were toned down instead, writes DN.
“Send the patient to the hospital”
When asked by the newspaper if resources were taken into account rather than knowledge about the best possible care, the department head of the National Board of Health and Welfare, Thomas Lindén, responds:
– A guideline cannot be applied without its context, and if there is no oxygen in a home but the patient needs it, the patient can be sent to the hospital.
Recently, the Minister of Social Affairs Lena Hallengren (S) opened up to stricter regulations on palliative care. This is after several instances where the elderly have been prioritized out of care and doctors have made decisions about palliative care at a distance.
