The first patient to be diagnosed with Ebola in the United States, Thomas Eric Duncan, died Oct. 8 at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas. The hospital, the Texas Department of State Health Services, and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have been working together to treat Mr. Duncan, who contracted the disease in Liberia, and monitor those he came in contact with for signs of disease. One main criticism in this case has been that, when Mr. Duncan initially presented at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital’s emergency department with fever, abdominal pain, headache, decreased urination, and a history of recent travel to Africa, he was prescribed antibiotics and sent home, instead of being placed in isolation and tested for Ebola.

Emergency departments will be on the front lines of identifying any new cases in the United States, whether they occur in people who have traveled to West Africa or people who have been exposed in this country. However, Ebola’s nonspecific symptoms—fever, headache, weakness, muscle pain, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pain—make it difficult to differentiate a potential case of Ebola from the flu and a host of other illnesses that commonly appear in the ED. Are you, your staff, and your emergency department prepared to identify possible cases of Ebola and respond appropriately?

The CDC has assembled a range of resources for health care professionals who need to know how to spot, contain, and treat Ebola. Below is an overview of the resources and information most pertinent to the ED, and you can find the latest critical information for physicians and other health care professionals at http://www.cdc.gov/vhf/ebola/.

How To Spot It

There are two main criteria that should be met before a patient suspected of having Ebola is isolated and tested:

If both criteria are met, then the patient should be moved to a private room with a bathroom, and standard, contact, and droplet precautions should be followed during further assessment.

The CDC has created a short Ebola screening information sheet [PDF] that can be customized to your hospital, distributed to staff, and hung in the ED for easy reference.