Analysis of epidemiological and clinical profile in COVID-19 deaths in a tertiary care ICU setup: a retrospective observational study

Abstract

There are numerous publications describing the epidemiology and clinical outcome of patients infected with COVID-19. However, limited studies solely describing the fatalities, especially in India. In this retrospective, single-centre analysis of patients’ case records, we aim to describe and discuss the demographics, clinical, laboratory findings in 201 patients who expired as a result of SARS CoV-2 infection. Electronic medical files of all confirmed COVID-19 patients, admitted to the ICU between 1st February 2020 and 15th July 2020, were scanned retrospectively and data was collected from files of the fatalities only, without revealing patient identity at any point. The data, including demographics (age, sex, comorbidities), clinical presentation, baseline laboratory parameters, SOFA score and duration of illness was recorded and analyzed statistically. A total of 201 deceased patients were included in the study, out of which 58.2% were males. The median age was 59 years (IQR: 47.5 – 65 years) which appears to be less than a lot of studies conducted outside India. Majority of patients had classical influenza-like symptoms at presentation (74.1%), but a sizable number also had extra-pulmonary manifestations (24.9%). Eight patients had isolated neurological presentation. It was found that number of comorbidities increased, and duration of illness decreased with increasing age, and this was statistically significant (p 0.03 and 0.01, respectively). SOFA score was found to be an important marker of severity of illness in COVID patients. ARDS remained the primary cause of death in 87.1% patients, although septic shock was observed in 34.8%. Six patients expired due to a high suspicion of pulmonary thromboembolism.