In this paper, we aimed to provide professional guidance to practising gastrointestinal (GI) endoscopists for the safe conduct of GI endoscopy procedures during the current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and future outbreaks of similar severe respiratory tract infections in Singapore. It draws on the lessons learnt during the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) epidemic and available published data concerning the COVID-19 pandemic. It addresses measures before, during and after endoscopy that must be considered for both non-infected and infected patients, and provides recommendations for practical implementation.
Betacoronavirus ; Coronavirus Infections ; epidemiology ; transmission ; Disease Transmission, Infectious ; prevention & control ; Endoscopy, Gastrointestinal ; standards ; Gastroenterologists ; standards ; Humans ; Incidence ; Pandemics ; Pneumonia, Viral ; epidemiology ; transmission ; Practice Guidelines as Topic ; Risk Factors ; Singapore ; epidemiology

In this paper, we aim to provide professional guidance to clinicians who are managing patients with chronic liver disease during the current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic in Singapore. We reviewed and summarised the available relevant published data on liver disease in COVID-19 and the advisory statements that were issued by major professional bodies, such as the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases and European Association for the Study of the Liver, contextualising the recommendations to our local situation.
COVID-19/epidemiology* ; Carcinoma, Hepatocellular/therapy* ; Chronic Disease ; Hepatitis B, Chronic/therapy* ; Hepatitis C, Chronic/therapy* ; Humans ; Liver Cirrhosis/therapy* ; Liver Diseases/therapy* ; Liver Neoplasms/therapy* ; Liver Transplantation ; Singapore/epidemiology*

Colonoscopy with endoscopic resection of detected colonic adenomas interrupts the adenoma-carcinoma sequence and reduces the incidence of colorectal cancer and cancer-related mortality. In the past decade, there have been significant developments in instruments and techniques for endoscopic polypectomy. Guidelines have been formulated by various professional bodies in Europe, Japan and the United States, but some of the recommendations differ between the various bodies. An expert professional workgroup under the auspices of the Academy of Medicine, Singapore, was set up to provide guidance on the endoscopic management of colonic polyps in Singapore. A total of 23 recommendations addressed the following issues: accurate description and diagnostic evaluation of detected polyps; techniques to reduce the risk of post-polypectomy bleeding and delayed perforation; the role of specific endoscopic resection techniques; the histopathological criteria for defining endoscopic cure; and the role of surveillance colonoscopy following curative resection.
Adenoma/surgery* ; Colonic Neoplasms/surgery* ; Colonic Polyps/surgery* ; Colonoscopy/methods* ; Colorectal Neoplasms/pathology* ; Humans ; Singapore ; United States