Background: COVID-19 a pandemic, affecting worldwide causing significant morbidity and to some extent mortality needs to be evaluated and urgently identify reliable predictors of disease severity and outcome. The fatal outcomes by COVID-19 are accompanied by cytokine storm syndrome. The cytokine storm is determined by serum ferritin. Aims and Objective: To determine the role of Serum ferritin in assessing the severity and outcome of COVID-19. Materials and Methods: A single-center, cross-sectional, observational study was conducted among SARS-CoV-2 infected patients from March 2020 to May 2020. The diagnosis was confirmed by real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). Serum ferritin levels were compared with the treatment outcomes of COVID-19 positive patients. Results: A total of 1977 COVID-19 patients were studied. The mean age was 43.89±15.58 years and had male preponderance of 61.56% of the total subjects. The mean serum ferritin levels among recovered and expired patients were 1225.6 ± 2502.91 ng/ml and 285.71 ± 391.99 ng/ml, respectively. Conclusion: Serum ferritin was markedly increased in COVID-19 patients who could not survive as compared to the patients who finally recovered from the infection, proving it as a useful marker for assessing the severity of COVID-19.

Background: Hemoglobin plays a vital role in tissue oxygenation. Hence anemia might significantly affect the prognosis of COVID 19 pneumonia, where in there is development of tissue hypoxia due to the disease pathogenesis. Aims and Objectives: To correlate the severity of anemia in COVID 19 patients with disease outcomes in patients admitted in a tertiary care setting. Materials and Methods: The prospective single-center study considered adults patients of both the gender, diagnosed with COVID-19 infection by RT-PCR technique. Necessary demographic, clinical data and Hemoglobin level were collected and selected subjects were followed-up until discharge or death. Subjects were classified as those who survived and succumbed to death. t-test was used for comparing continuous variables and chi-square test for categorical data between the groups. Results: The study included 1212 patients, where in there was a statistically significant correlation between low hemoglobin level and the disease outcome. The hemoglobin levels were significantly lower in patients who died than the patients who were discharged. Conclusion: Severe anemia as noted by low hemoglobin level was associated with higher mortality than subjects with normal hemoglobin.

Background: Tuberculosis (TB) and Human Imuunodeficiency Virus (HIV) co-infection has detrimental effects on both the individual and the health care system especially in resource limited countries like India. Tuberculosis ranks among the most common cause of death in HIV patients. In this review we have analysed the clinical and immunological characteristics of HIV-TB coinfected patients and their clinical outcomes. Aims and Objectives: To assess the co-relation between socio-demographic characteristics, clinical and immunological Profile of HIV-TB co-infected patients and the clinical outcome. Materials and Methods: A retrospective clinical study of patient records at the Centre of Excellence for anti-retroviral therapy was done. The records of HIV-TB co-infected patients were collected and data extracted pertaining to the socio-demographic characteristics, clinical profiles and outcomes. Results: Among the 377 cases included as per criteria, 76.9 % completed the treatment for TB while 23.1% patients died before treatment completion. Twenty-nine point seven percent of the patient population constituted women, while 0.5% was transgenders. Regarding the pattern of tuberculosis, 58.4% patients had extra pulmonary TB while 39.5% and 2.1% of the study population were diagnosed as pulmonary and disseminated TB respectively. Mean baseline CD4 count was 191 cells/mm3 and the mean CD4 count during first and second follow up were 298 and 362 cells/mm3 respectively. There was a statistically significant correlation noted with poor clinical outcomes and low baseline CD4 counts. Conclusion: Age, gender, the clinical pattern of tuberculosis and the treatment category did not have a statistically significant association on the outcome. We found that the TB associated mortality in HIV co-infected patients had a direct correlation with the stage of HIV at presentation as there was a strongly significant association between low CD4 counts and adverse clinical outcomes.

Background: Influenza-like illness (ILI) and severe acute respiratory infection (SARI) are the important manifestations in day today clinical practice in COVID era. A number of clinical investigations including haematological parameters are used for the risk stratification of the patients. This study was undertaken in order to find the applicability of platelet to lymphocyte ratio in risk stratification.Methods: A prospective study was undertaken in Victoria hospital and Bowring and Lady Curzon hospitals attached to BMCRI tertiary care hospitals in Bangalore for a period of one and half years. All the patients were subjected for clinical and haematological evaluation and appropriate ratios were calculated. A total of 266 patients were enrolled in the study, out of which 144 were COVID negative and 122 were COVID positive. The data was analyzed using appropriate statistical methods using statistical package for social sciences (SPSS) version 24.Results: The mean age of the COVID negative patients was 43.37 years and COVID positive patient was 49.08 years. Males outnumbered females. There was statistically significant difference in mean platelet to lymphocyte ratio between the COVID positive and negative cases (226.4 versus 399.38). The area under curve was 0.614 for the platelet to lymphocyte ratio (PLR) in patients with severe and non-severe ILI and SARI cases. Majority of the haematological parameters were significantly different in SARI patients who were COVID positive and negative.Conclusions: PLR can be used as an indicator for risk stratification in ILI and SARI patients.

Background: SARS‐Cov‐2 is a coronavirus that caused the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) disease outbreak in late 2019 in Wuhan China. By early 2020, the disease had rapidly spread across the world and was declared a global pandemic as a public health emergency of international concern. The mechanisms behind the behavior of SARS-cov-2 in the elderly include immunosenescence and related impaired antiviral immunity, mature immunity, and related hyper-inflammatory responses. We aim to summarize the clinical features and outcomes of elderly COVID-19 patients and compare the difference between young-old patients (60–74 years old) and elderly-old patients (≥75 years old). Aims and Objective: (1) The aim of the study was to compare the clinical and biochemical profile of young-old patients and elderly-old COVID-19 patients. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted on a total of 389 patients, during the study period from March 2021 to September 2021. Case record form with follow-up chart was used to record the duration of disease, history of treatment, and complications. Patients underwent biochemical investigations. Results: The study includes 389 patients, 331 were not young-old and 58 were elderly-old. Mean age of young-old group 65.01±4.10 years and elderly-old group 80.74±5.35 years. Mortality in elderly-old group (29.3%) and young-old group (15.4%) with significant P=0.02. Comparing inflammatory markers such as total leucocyte count and neutrophil count are more in elderly-old than young-old COVID-19 patients, this difference is statistically significant P<0.005. Conclusion: Elderly patients usually have chronic comorbidities and are likely to have a severe or critically severe condition. They could show atypical symptoms. Elderly-old patients tend to have more complications than young-old patients during hospitalization. Careful nursing, observation, and systemic treatment are very important in elderly patients.