HEMOCOVID-19: an international project evaluating microvascular and endothelial dysfunction in COVID-19 patients with diffuse optics

As coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has spread across the world, the surge in patients requiring ICU admission has been overwhelming.The rapid diagnosis and isolation, clinical management, and infection prevention are the main challenges associated with this pandemic. When the disease becomes critical, adequate management of acute respiratory failure and supporting the hemodynamics is key in order to minimize the negative impact on survival. However, many questions on prognosis and efficient clinical management remain unanswered. HEMOCOVID-19 uses near-infrared diffuse optical technologies to non-invasively evaluate endothelial and microvascular dysfunction to aid both the development of targeted therapies and also to personalize rescue therapies. HEMOCOVID-19 has eleven partners in four countries and is open for new members. I will present the project and the preliminary results. I will then briefly explain the vision for the longer-term.