Correlation between hospitalized patients' demographics, symptoms, comorbidities, and COVID-19 pandemic in Bahia, Brazil

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 15; no. 12; p. e0243966
• Main Authors: Macedo, Márcio C F, Pinheiro, Isabelle M, Carvalho, Caio J L, Fraga, Hilda C J R, Araujo, Isaac P C, Montes, Simone S, Araujo, Otávio A C, Alves, Lucas A, Saba, Hugo, Araújo, Márcio L V, Queiroz, Ivonete T L, Sampaio, Romilson L, Souza, Márcia S P L, da Silva, Ana Claudia F N, Souza, Antonio C S
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science 14.12.2020; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: Adult; Aged; Biology and Life Sciences; Brazil - epidemiology; Comorbidity; Confidence intervals; Coronavirus Infections - complications; Coronavirus Infections - epidemiology; Coronavirus Infections - therapy; Coronavirus Infections - virology; Coronaviruses; Correlation; COVID-19; COVID-19 - complications; COVID-19 - epidemiology; COVID-19 - therapy; COVID-19 - virology; Datasets; Demographic aspects; Demographics; Demography; Diagnosis; Distribution; Epidemics; Female; Health risks; Hospitalization; Humans; Intensive Care Units; Kidney diseases; Male; Medicine and Health Sciences; Middle Aged; Mortality; Pandemics; People and places; Pharyngitis; Pneumonia, Viral - complications; Pneumonia, Viral - epidemiology; Pneumonia, Viral - therapy; Pneumonia, Viral - virology; Pregnancy; Regression analysis; Respiration, Artificial - methods; Risk Factors; Risk management; Risk reduction; SARS-CoV-2 - pathogenicity; Signs and symptoms; Software; Statistical analysis; Brazil
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0243966

In this paper, we provide a retrospective cohort study with patients that have been hospitalized for general or intensive care unit admission due to COVID-19, between March 3 and July 29, 2020, in the state of Bahia, Brazil. We aim to correlate those patients' demographics, symptoms and comorbidities, with the risk of mortality from COVID-19, length of hospital stay, and time from diagnosis to definitive outcome. On the basis of a dataset provided by the Health Secretary of the State of Bahia, we selected 3,896 hospitalized patients from a total of 154,868 COVID-19 patients that included non-hospitalized patients and patients with invalid registration in the dataset. Then, we statistically analyzed whether there was a significant correlation between the patient record data and the COVID-19 pandemic, and our main findings reinforced by the use of a multivariable logistic regression were that older age (Odds Ratio [OR] = 1.03, 95% Confidence Interval [CI] = 1.03-1.04, p-value (p) <0.001), an initial symptom of shortness of breath (OR = 1.88, 95% CI = 1.60-2.20, p < 0.001), and the presence of comorbidities, mainly chronic kidney disease (OR = 2.41, 95% CI = 1.67-3.48, p < 0.001) are related to an increased risk of mortality from COVID-19. On the other hand, sore throat (OR = 0.74, 95% CI = 0.58-0.95, p = 0.02) and length of hospital stay (OR = 0.96, 95% CI = 0.58-0.95, p < 0.001) are more related to a reduced risk of mortality from COVID-19. Moreover, a multivariable linear regression conducted with statistically significant variables (p < 0.05) showed that age (OR = 0.97, 95% CI = 0.95-0.98, p < 0.001) and time from diagnosis to definitive outcome (OR = 1.67, 95% CI = 1.64-1.71, p < 0.001) are associated with the length of hospital stay.