The development of a COVID-19 scoring system for effective and safe triage of patients in the primary care setting.

Project description With the recently started corona emergency centers, where patients suspected of having COVID-19 are assessed by a general practitioner, the entire primary care is separated into a 'corona-suspect' and a 'non-corona-suspect' side. When the primary health complaint is unlikely to be caused by infection with SARS-CoV-2, but the patient may still have symptoms of the COVID-19 clinical picture, he or she is referred to the 'corona-suspect' side. This precaution generates many unnecessary references to the corona emergency room, where patients are exposed to an environment with risk of contamination. There is a great need among general practitioners for an objective rule about deciding on which side to evaluate patients with possible COVID-19 symptoms. The purpose of this research is to develop a simple rule to support this decision. This must be immediately implementable at all GP practices and emergency centers.