Epidemiological, clinical, and laboratory findings for patients of different age groups with confirmed coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in a hospital in Saudi Arabia

  1. Mutasim E. Ibrahim
  2. Obaid S. AL-Aklobi
  3. Mosleh M. Abomughaid
  4. Mushabab A. Al-Ghamdi

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Abstract

Although the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic continues to rage worldwide, clinical and laboratory studies of this disease have been limited in many countries. We investigated the epidemiologic, clinical, and laboratory findings of COVID-19 infected patients to identify the effective indicators correlated with the disease.

Methods

A retrospective study was conducted at King Abdullah Hospital in Bisha Province, Saudi Arabia, from March 20 to June 30, 2020. Patients of different age groups were confirmed as having COVID-19 infection using a real-time polymerase chain reaction. The demographic, clinical, and laboratory data of the patients were statistically analyzed.

Results

Of the 132 patients, 85 were male and 47 were female, with a mean age of 50.9 years (SD±16.7). The patients were elderly (n = 29) and adults (n = 103). Of these, 54 (40.9%) had comorbidities, (25%) were admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU), and 12 (9.1%) died. On admission, the main clinical manifestations were fever (84.1%), cough (64.4%), shortness of breath (25%), chest pain (20.5%), and fatigue (18.2%). In all patients, increased neutrophils and decreased lymphocytes were observed. Patients’ lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) was elevated. C-reactive protein (CRP) was elevated in 48.5%, D-dimer in 43.2%, and the erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) in 40.9% of patients. The elderly showed higher neutrophil (p = 0.011) and lower lymphocyte (p = 0.009) counts than adults. Glucose, creatine kinase-MB, LDH, bilirubin, D-dimer, and ESR were significantly higher in the elderly than in the adults. The COVID-19 death group had a higher leucocyte count (p = 0.036), and higher urea (p = 0.029) and potassium (p = 0.022) than the recovered group but had a lower hemoglobin concentration (p = 0.018). A significant association was determined between COVID-19 death and the presence of cardiovascular disease (χ2(1) = 16.297, p<0.001), hypertension (χ2(1) = 12.034, p = 0.001), renal failure (χ2(1) = 3.843, p = 0. 05), old age (t (130) = 4.9, p <0.001), and ICU admission (χ2(1) = 17.6 (1), p<0.001).

Conclusions

Investigating some of the laboratory and clinical parameters could help assess the disease progression, risk of mortality, and follow up patients who could progress to a fatal condition.

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  1. Version published to 10.1371/journal.pone.0250955
  2. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2020.10.21.20217083: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Institutional Review Board StatementIRB: Ethical clearance: This study was reviewed and approved by the Research Ethics Local Committee at the College of Medicine, University of Bisha (UBCOM/ H-06-BH-087 (05/03)).
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    Software and Algorithms
    SentencesResources
    Statistical analysis: Data were entered and analyzed using the software Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS version 22) (Armonk, NY: IBM Corp.).
    SPSS
    suggested: (SPSS, RRID:SCR_002865)

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:
    Limitations: Our study has several limitations: First, the sample size was relatively small, especially for the children’s group, and may not fully reflect the characteristics of the disease for this group. Therefore, a large sample size could give a more comprehensive understanding of 2019-nCoV. Second, the study findings might have been biased by reporting only confirmed cases in a single hospital center. Further studies that include suspected and undiagnosed cases may show some differences. Third, we statistically analyzed the laboratory findings based on a comparison of means, median, and proportions between different age groups that were not subdivided into groups of patients with individual comorbid conditions. Finally, the study assessed the epidemiological, laboratory, and clinical characteristics of COVID-19 on admission of the patients; more detailed information from other laboratory tests and clinical outcomes were unavailable at the time of analysis.

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    About SciScore

    SciScore is an automated tool that is designed to assist expert reviewers by finding and presenting formulaic information scattered throughout a paper in a standard, easy to digest format. SciScore checks for the presence and correctness of RRIDs (research resource identifiers), and for rigor criteria such as sex and investigator blinding. For details on the theoretical underpinning of rigor criteria and the tools shown here, including references cited, please follow this link.

  3. Version published to 10.1101/2020.10.21.20217083 on medRxiv