Clinical Profile and Treatment of COVID-19 Patients: Experiences from an Ethiopian Treatment Center

Abstract

COVID-19 is not well studied in Africa. Understanding the clinical profile and management of COVID-19 will help to plan better prevention and treatment strategies taking the local context into consideration. In this study, we described the clinical profile, treatment used, and outcomes of COVID-19 patients in one of the COVID-19 treatment centers of Ethiopia, Boru Meda Hospital. An institution-based retrospective cross-sectional study was carried out using medical records of COVID-19 patients who were admitted to Boru Meda Hospital with a positive reverse transcription (RT)-PCR result from May 9, 2020 to September 20, 2020. All patients with a positive RT-PCR were admitted to the hospital, regardless of symptom and severity status. A total of 279 COVID-19 patients were included in the final analysis. The median age of patients was 28 years (interquartile range 23–40). The majority (69.5%) were male. Around a quarter (n = 73; 26.2%) of the patients were symptomatic, of which cough (n = 49; 67.1%) and fever (n = 32; 43.8%) were common symptoms. Among symptomatic patients, 48 (65.8%) were mild, four (5.5%) moderate, 12 (16.4%) severe, and nine (12.3%) were critical. The case fatality rate was 2.1%. Hypertension, age older than 25 years, and HIV/AIDS were significantly associated with symptomatic infection. In this study, most of the COVID-19 patients were asymptomatic. However, the proportion of severe and critical patients among those with symptoms was high. More studies are needed to assess the effect of HIV/AIDS on the severity and mortality of COVID-19.

Factors Associated for COVID19 Severity Among Patients Treated at Selgalu Treatment Center Assosa in Ethiopia: A Case–Control Study

“…Different studies report symptoms have been associated with covid19 severity. 20 , 21 The study conducted in our country. 22 And Wuhan and shanghai china reveals majority of patients were symptomatic.…”

Clinical presentation, outcomes and factors associated with mortality: A prospective study from three COVID-19 referral care centres in West Africa

“…There have been a few retrospective population or hospital-based cohorts reporting mortality rates from COVID-19 in Africa so far, but no cohorts that provide individual-level prospective evidence on the severity of the disease. (Abdela et al, 2020;Boulle et al, 2020;El Aidaoui et al, 2020;Elimian et al, 2020;Kirenga et al, 2020;Mekolo et al, 2021;Nachega et al, 2020) We report here clinical data collected prospectively on patients hospitalized in the COVID-19 referral care centers of two West African countries between March and November 2020.…”

Clinical features and predictors of mortality among hospitalized patients with COVID-19 in Niger

“…Analyzing the association between chronic comorbidity and COVID-19 severity/fatality by country of residence, Zhou et al found that such odds were highly and significantly increased for obesity in France (compared to that in USA, UK and China), for hypertension/ cardiovascular diseases in China and for diabetes in the USA [ 26 ]. HIV-infection and/or tuberculosis independently predicted the hazard of death in South Africa [ 12 ] and of severity in Ethiopia [ 27 ], but not in studies from the USA [ 15 , 28 ]. As such, the call by The African Forum for Research and Education in Health [ 6 , 7 ] to pool COVID-19 data from African countries very necessary to enhance COVID-19 epidemiology in Africa to ensure an adaptive response at both hospital and community levels.…”