Helen MacDonald

They found that around a quarter of them had troponin levels that were above normal, that they had elevated D-dimer levels, about double the upper limit of normal.

And some of them had other signs which might be consistent with troponin.

And conditions such as PE, but might also be consistent with acute respiratory disease.

So quite a lot of them had tachycardia approaching a half and a lot of them had low oxygen saturations around one in five had oxygen saturations of less than 90%.

It's a little bit difficult to put this in perspective because I'm not sure how that kind of picture differs from what you would expect with either people who are severely ill in hospital or specifically for people with acute respiratory distress syndrome for some other reason.

But based on data like this, some French guidance came out

as they were in their peak, suggesting that COVID patients are divided into high, medium and lower risk of having thrombotic disease, partly based on normal risk factors, but also looking at certain features of their COVID disease as well.

And then moving on to suggest that perhaps some of those might receive prophylactic

low molecular weight heparin, some of them might receive higher doses or even treatment doses.

And to me, that was quite puzzling to understand whether that was a reasonable response or not.

And I certainly seen a debate on Twitter around whether in light of that uncertainty, you act and do something, I guess is one perspective, or whether you stand back.

And as Carl and several other of the guests that we've had on here over recent times have advocated,

Here is an uncertainty.

And this is a starting point for us to try and explore this now using a trial to answer what is the role of low molecular weight heparin in COVID patients?

Does it reduce their chance of having pulmonary embolus?

And is that suitable for patients who are in hospital?

Or should that be considered more broadly for people with milder disease who might be out in the community?

I have.

I have.

It's become a little bit of an obsession of mine, actually.