Complications with moderate-to-severe COVID-19 during hospital admissions in patients with pneumonia

Abstract

Introduction: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2) is an infectious disease that has caused significant mortality and morbidity worldwide. COVID-19 is known to cause complications, such as myocardial damage, acute coronary syndrome, deep vein thrombosis, pulmonary embolism, arrhythmia, heart failure, acute ischemic stroke, liver damage, cytokine storms, ischemia-reperfusion damage and side effects of drug treatments. In our study, we aimed to evaluate the complications that developed during hospitalizations in patients with moderate-to-severe COVID-19 related pneumonia who were hospitalized in our COVID-19 service. Material and Method: This study included patients with moderate-to-severe COVID-19 pneumonia with a positive reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test who were treated in our COVID-19 service between November 2020 and January 2021. Their demographic characteristics, treatment regimens, baseline laboratory values and complications during their hospitalization were retrospectively recorded. Results: The study group had a mean age of 62.92± 14.60 years and 40.6% (n= 55) were female. Approximately 35.3% (n= 48) of the patients developed complications due to COVID-19 during their follow-up period. Of the patients with complications, 63.8% (n: 30) were male, most common complications were elevated liver enzymes (47.9%) and pulmonary thromboembolism (20.8%). Of those patients with complications, the most common comorbidities were hypertension (40.4% [n= 19]), diabetes mellitus (25.5% [n=12]) and cardiovascular disease (23.4% [n=11]). There were no significant relationships between the presence of complications and age, sex or comorbid diseases (p>0.05 for each). Conclusion: There are more underlying conditions, such as hypertension, diabetes mellitus, cardiovascular disease, chronic lung disease in hospitalized patients with moderate-to-severe pneumonia compared to outpatients with COVID-19 pneumonia. Complications develop, especially in the management of COVID-19 pneumonia, which affect the treatment process and patient mobilization.

Keywords

• complication
• COVID-19
• pneumonia

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