In February 2020, when a new coronavirus first started driving patients into the Hôpitaux Universitaires de Genève (HUG, Geneva University Hospitals), Switzerland’s biggest university hospital, doctors noted that some of them seemed confused. “Patients had acute neurological symptoms, so we consulted local neurologist, whose first reactions, understandably, were, ‘wait, it’s a respiratory disease, not a neurological condition’. — but because we all worked so closely and discussed openly, just few weeks later, the neurological symptoms became clear,” said Prof.
Dr Thomas Agoritsas, an internist at HUG and expert on health research methodology, who is also part of a methods core team at WHO that advises on guidelines.