The United Kingdom is set to initiate a drug trial called HEAL-COVID in an effort to alleviate the mortality rate and readmission cases in patients who have previously been hospitalised with the novel coronavirus.
According to the report by Clinical Trials Arena, data collated by the UK Office for National Statistics indicated that 29 per cent of Covid-19 hospitalised patients were readmitted within six months. While more than 12 per cent died within the same period.
So, the new trial will help the government find out drugs that can reduce deaths and hospital readmissions in Covid-19 survivors.
The study is funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) and the NIHR Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre. The trial will be led by Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and the University of Cambridge.
This will be carried out in collaboration with the Liverpool Clinical Trials Centre at the University of Liverpool and Wrexham-based clinical trial technology firm Aparito.
HEAL-COVID (short for Helping to Alleviate the Longer-term consequences of Covid-19) will test a selection of safe, existing drugs already on the market on patients across the UK in order to find effective treatments, according to the official release.
“Having survived the trauma of being hospitalized with Covid-19, far too many patients find themselves back in the hospital with new or long-term complications,” said study lead from the University of Cambridge and Addenbrooke’s Hospital Dr. Charlotte Summers.
“Unfortunately, many go on to die in the months after being discharged. This trial is the first of its kind to look at what drugs we could use to reduce the devastating impact on patients.”
HEAL-COVID will examine people who are fresh out of the hospital, following their first admission for Covid-19.