Risk of COVID-19 transmission in esophageal, anorectal manometry, and 24-hour impedance-pH monitoring

Background The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has led to the interruption of most manometry or impedance-pH monitoring studies. The risk to restarting activities is unknown. Objective Assess the risk of SARS-Cov-2 virus contagion, both to patients and healthcare workers in relation to esophageal and anorectal functional tests during the pandemic without protective measures. Method A questionnaire was designed to find out whether patients and healthcare workers had COVID-19, confirmed either by a test or only compatible symptoms, after functional studies were performed from January until March 2020. Results 263 (92.9%) patients answered the survey. In the two weeks after functional test, four (1.52%) patients had confirmed COVID-19 (adjusted rate 8.34 cases per 1,000 (95% CI -0.06-16.74), OR 0.84 (95% CI: 0.83-0.85), p