Clinical Management of Patients with Ebola Virus Disease in High-Resource Settings

Like most viral illnesses in humans, supportive care of the patient is the mainstay of clinical care for patients with Ebola virus disease (EVD). The goal is to maintain and sustain the patient until a specific immune response develops and clears the viral infection. Clearly, antiviral therapy may eventually help speed recovery, but supportive care will likely always be the centerpiece of care of the patient with EVD. While terrible in terms of human suffering and loss, the EVD outbreak of 2014-2016 provided an unheralded opportunity to advance our understanding in the care of patients (WHO 2016). Regardless of the care setting, resource-rich or resource-constrained, it is beneficial to have an established team of care providers. This team should consist of nurses and physicians who are familiar with clinical care of patients with EVD and have demonstrated competency using necessary personal protective equipment (PPE). Consideration should be given to having several physician specialties on the team, including critical care, infectious diseases, and anesthesiology. Additional individuals in other medical specialties should be identified in case needed during the course of caring for a patient. The National Ebola Training and Education Center (NETEC) has detailed guidance on preparations for developing a high-containment unit and care team (NETEC 2016).