HealthDay Reports: Could Survivors' Blood Help Patients Battling COVID-19? Trials May Tell
Image: Domenico Piccininni donating blood
Two researchers are looking at if blood plasma from recovered COVID-19 patients could help prevent new infections or help ease the symptoms in those who are already infected.
Could Survivors' Blood Help Patients Battling COVID-19? Trials May Tell
WEDNESDAY, May 13, 2020 (HealthDay News) -- Could blood plasma drawn from people who've recovered from COVID-19 help prevent new coronavirus infections or ease symptoms in those already infected?
Two groups of researchers aim to find out.
One clinical trial, from doctors at NYU Grossman School of Medicine, Montefiore Health System and Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City, will try to determine whether "convalescent plasma" injected into hospitalized COVID-19 patients can protect them from developing severe disease or requiring a ventilator.
Meanwhile, researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore are poised to launch a pair of new studies looking at the use of plasma in health care workers and those who are sick at home with COVID-19.
Dr. Corita Grudzen, vice chair for research in NYU Langone Health's department of emergency medicine, wrote the study protocol for the New York City study.
"What we hope to see is that convalescent plasma, used at this stage of disease, so early on, prevents patients from dying, from going on a mechanical ventilator, or any sort of bad outcome," Grudzen said in a HealthDay Live interview.