Universal checklist for COVID-19 control measures: consensus via a Delphi method
Background
With millions of people infected worldwide, COVID-19 has a high infectivity rate which prompted governments in many countries to launch untested policies and guidelines of unknown impact to contain its spread. We formed an international collaborative group of experts to reach a consensus on a universal checklist that consisted of the most widely implemented containment measures and their timing. This resulting checklist may help further studies to validate the effectiveness of the included measures to ascertain an international response plan against future pandemics.
Methods
We conducted a two-round modified Delphi study on the expert panel using an email survey. The process of developing the checklist was divided into five phases: planning phase, drafting phase, consensus phase via the Delphi method, dissemination phase, and the maintenance phase.
Results
An initial checklist consisting of questions about 51 measures was generated after a systematic review and sent to the experts for rating. Out of the 21 experts who indicated an interest in participating in the study, only 15 completed at least one round of our study and helped create the final checklist. This consisted of 62 measures divided up into the following categories: policy and health system, research, social distancing and barriers, preventive and containment measures, and additional items. The experts were predominantly highly experienced representatives of decision-making healthcare management during COVID-19.
Conclusion
A universal checklist of 62 COVID-19 containment measures (Box 1) was developed after meeting experts' consensus via a modified two-round Delphi study with information on what measures they think should be expected during each Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) stage of the pandemic.
Conflicts of interest
None declared.
- © Royal College of Physicians 2021. All rights reserved.
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