No abstract

Lei, MD have contributed equally to this work.Word count: 3166 All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission. the author/funder, who has granted medRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. AbstractBackground: The clinical outcomes of COVID-19 patients in Hubei and other areas are different. We aim to investigate the epidemiological and clinical characteristics of patient with COVID-19 in Hunan which is adjacent to Hubei. Methods:In this double-center, observational study, we recruited all consecutive patients with laboratory confirmed COVID-19 from January 23 to February 14, 2020 in two designated hospitals in Hunan province, China. Epidemiological and clinical data from patients' electronic medical records were collected and compared between mild, moderate and severe/critical group in detail. Clinical outcomes were followed up to February 20, 2020. Findings: 291 patients with COVID-19 were categorized into mild group (10.0%), moderate group (72.8%) and severe/critical group (17.2%). The median age of all patients was 46 years (49.8% were male). 86.6% patients had an indirect exposure history. The proportion of patients that had been to Wuhan in severe/critical group (48.0% vs 17.2%, p=0.006) and moderate group (43.4% vs 17.2%, p=0.007) were higher than mild group. Fever (68.7%), cough (60.5%), and fatigue (31.6%) were common symptoms especially for severe and critical patients. Typical lung imaging finding were bilateral and unilateral ground glass opacity or consolidation. Leukopenia, lymphopenia and eosinopenia occurred in 36.1%, 22.7% and 50.2% patients respectively. Increased fibrinogen was detected in 45 of 58 (77.6%) patients with available results. 29 of 44 (65.9%) or 22 of 40 (55.0%) patients were positive in Mycoplasma pneumonia or Chlamydia pneumonia antibody test respectively.Compared with mild or moderate group, severe/critical group had a relative higher level of neutrophil, All rights reserved. No reuse allowed without permission. the author/funder, who has granted medRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity.