Bethesda Hospital first in the nation to use steroid as standard protocol for treating COVID-19

Bethesda Hospital in St. Paul said it is one of the first in the country to make dexamethasone a standard protocol for treating COVID-19 patients.

Dexamethasone is a common steroid that has recently shown success in treating coronavirus.

Researchers at the University of Oxford in England released results from a large study in mid-June, where they dosed dexamethasone in more than 2,000 COVID-19 patients. They found it cut the risk of death by a third for patients on ventilators and reduced deaths by 20% for those on oxygen.

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"This is an important moment in the fight against this virus," said British Health Minister Matt Hancock. "It’s the first time that anyone in the world has clinically proven that a drug can improve the survival chances for the most seriously ill coronavirus patients."

The ICU medical director at Bethesda said their team had already been giving steroids to the sickest patients there but when the British study came out, they decided to expand their use of dexamethasone.

Bethesda is the only hospital in Minnesota that exclusively treats COVID-19 patients.

"I think because we have such a heavy research angle to our department at M Health Fairview, we’re the most nimble and kind of the first ones to start using these new medications as they come out," said ICU Medical Director Dr. Erica Kuhlmann, who is also chief of staff at Bethesda.

Kuhlmann is a pulmonary and critical care physician who sees coronavirus patients. She said even though they use many different treatments with each patient, she believes the outcomes with dexamethasone may be more promising than other treatments.

"The result of giving steroids is more impressive than the convalescent plasma, in my personal experience, and in the data we have so far," Kuhlmann said.

Even though dexamethasone is a newer option in the fight against COVID-19, the steroid has been around for decades. It is widely available around the world and inexpensive.

"It’s not something that we have to go back and manufacture a whole new stockpile of," Kuhlmann said. "We have it already in circulation and we’ve been using it for a long time for other illnesses."

She said COVID-19 patients at Bethesda are given a daily dose of dexamethasone for, on average, about 10 days.

"Really what it does is it reduces inflammation in the body," Kuhlmann said. "Your body mounts a response not only to the COVID virus itself, but your body has a secondary inflammation response to any kind of virus, specifically this COVID virus. If we can stop your body from having such a robust inflammatory response, then it can help people heal faster."

She said they can give dexamethasone as a tablet or through an IV. Patients usually start improving within a few days.

"People need to realize that, medically, we are advancing throughout the course of this disease and we have these new treatments that people should feel optimistic about," Kuhlmann said.