Nosocomial outbreaks leading to healthcare worker (HCW) infection and death have been increasingly reported during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.

We implemented a strategy to reduce nosocomial acquisition.

We summarized our experience in implementing a multipronged infection control strategy in the first 300 days (December 31, 2019, to October 25, 2020) of the COVID-19 pandemic under the governance of Hospital Authority in Hong Kong.

Of 5,296 COVID-19 patients, 4,808 (90.8%) were diagnosed in the first pandemic wave (142 cases), second wave (896 cases), and third wave (3,770 cases) in Hong Kong. With the exception of 1 patient who died before admission, all COVID-19 patients were admitted to the public healthcare system for a total of 78,834 COVID-19 patient days. The median length of stay was 13 days (range, 1–128). Of 81,955 HCWs, 38 HCWs (0.05%; 2 doctors and 11 nurses and 25 nonprofessional staff) acquired COVID-19. With the exception of 5 of 38 HCWs (13.2%) infected by HCW-to-HCW transmission in the nonclinical settings, no HCW had documented transmission from COVID-19 patients in the hospitals. The incidence of COVID-19 among HCWs was significantly lower than that of our general population (0.46 per 1,000 HCWs vs 0.71 per 1,000 population; P = .008). The incidence of COVID-19 among professional staff was significantly lower than that of nonprofessional staff (0.30 vs 0.66 per 1,000 full-time equivalent; P = .022).

A hospital-based approach spared our healthcare service from being overloaded. With our multipronged infection control strategy, no nosocomial COVID-19 in was identified among HCWs in the first 300 days of the COVID-19 pandemic in Hong Kong.

An in-house self-held respiration monitoring device (SHRMD) was developed for providing deep inspiration breath hold (DIBH) radiotherapy. The use of SHRMD is evaluated in terms of reproducibility, stability and heart dose reduction.

Sixteen patients receiving radiotherapy of left breast cancer were planned for treatment with both a free breathing (FB) scan and a DIBH scan. Both FB and DIBH plans were generated for comparison of the heart, left anterior descending (LAD) artery and lung dose. All patients received their treatments with DIBH using SHRMD. Megavoltage cine images were acquired during treatments for evaluating the reproducibility and stability of treatment position using SHRMD.

Compared with FB plans, the maximum dose to the heart by DIBH technique with SHRMD was reduced by 29·9 ± 15·6%; and the maximum dose of the LAD artery was reduced by 41·6 ± 18·3%. The inter-fractional overall mean error was 0·01 cm and the intra-fractional overall mean error was 0·04 cm.

This study demonstrated the potential benefits of using the SHRMD for DIBH to reduce the heart and LAD dose. The patients were able to perform stable and reproducible DIBHs.