CLINICAL CHARACTERISTICS, LABORATORY ABNORMALITIES AND OUTCOME OF COVID-19 POSITIVE PATIENTS ADMITTED IN TERTIARY CARE HOSPITAL OF KARACHI

Background and Objective:COVID-19 is a corona virus disease infecting people worldwide. There are few local small-scale studies addressing this. We planned a study with good sample size to reveal clinical features and laboratory abnormalities in relation to ICU admission and mortality. Methods and Materials: This observational study was conducted at Dept. of Medicine Liyari General Hospital Karachi after ethical approval. The indoorconfirmed COVID-19 (PCR positive) patients (age>18 years) were included. Pregnant/lactating women, outdoor cases were excluded. Their demographic data, symptoms and signs,co morbidities, laboratory findings (blood complete picture, renal/liver function tests, inflammatory markers (i.e., CRP, ESR, ferritin, LDH, D dimers, troponins), area and duration of admission, disease severity, outcome as death or recovery were documented. Data was collected manually from record of the patients admitted from 15th March till 30th September 2020. The data was analyzed by SPSS software. Chi-square test applied with significant p<0.05. Results:Amongst879 patients 773(87.9%) were admitted in isolation wards whereas 106(12.1%) admitted in ICU. Mortality was 3.9% overall and average length of stay was 11 days. The mean age was 51.8+18.4 years. Most cases were male (65%) and > 50 yearsage (58.9%).Frequent co morbidities were diabetes(26.1%), dyslipidemia (23%), hypertension (19.9%) and ischemic heart disease (17.3%). Fever wasmost common symptom. Tachycardia, hypotension, anemia and lymphocytopenia wereassociated with ICU admission and mortality.Inflammatory markers were elevated in most of the cases but only LDH, ferritin and D-dimers were statistically associated with ICU admission and mortality. Conclusion:This study concludes that COVID-19 positive patients with age above fifty, tachycardia, hypotension elevated LDH, Ferritin, D dimers anemia and lymphocytopenia were associated with mortality and ICU admission.