The American College of Rheumatology (ACR) has issued a guidance document for rheumatologists and rheumatology health professionals to consider as practices, business and patient care begins to reopen in this next phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. This document discusses local conditions, design reopening procedures, monitoring and patient advice for this transition.   

Dr. Jack Cush reviews the News and Journal Reports from the past week on RheumNow.com.

In an Annals of Rheumatic Disease report, Italian investigators performed consecutive testing for SARS-CoV-2 (IgM and IgG) between 25 March to 25 May 2020 and compared test results between rheumatic disease (RMD) patients and the general population. 

According to a small, observational study out of UCLA published as correspondence in the NEJM on July 21, 2020, those with mild COVID-19 symptoms showed an approximate antibody half-life of 73 days. COVID-19 infection was confirmed by PCR in 30 out of 34 study participants. The remaining four patients developed consistent symptoms and cohabitated with a person who had a known positive test but could not get testing due to availability or mild

The number of reporting cases of COVID-19 infection tends to underestimate the true prevalence of infection as only the more severe cases (e.g.,acute respiratory syndrome) get tested or go to the hospital. JAMA Internal Medicine reports that a cross-sectional seroprevalence study from the U.S. shows that COVID-19 is underreported and that actual infection rates can be 6 to 24 times more prevalent than currently reported infections due to