Results
As of April 20, 2020, there were 100 patients consecutively hospitalized
with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 whose age distribution and baseline
characteristics are summarized in Table 1 . Most patients had
advanced age with a median of 75 years old (range 28-96) and more than
61% were older than 70 years old. There was a high burden of
comorbidities, the most frequent being hypertension (63%), diabetes
mellitus (22%) and different cardiovascular diseases including heart,
cerebrovascular and peripheral artery diseases (28%). There was a high
risk for mortality according to the PROFUND score. In contrast, few
patients were active of former smokers or had other conditions such as
chronic respiratory diseases, malignancy or HIV infection (only one
patient). Table 2 shows
clinical, radiological and
laboratory findings. The most frequent symptoms were fever (80%), cough
(69%), fatigue (59%) and dyspnoea (52%) but other symptoms such as
anorexia (36%) or diarrhoea (21%) were not uncommon. The most common
findings on chest radiographs were bilateral interstitial infiltrates
(65%) and no radiographic abnormality was found in 11 patients (11%).
Only two chest CT were performed showing pulmonary thromboembolism in
both cases. Lung ultrasound (LUS) was performed in 46 patients and only
3 patients (6.5%) had no abnormalities. The most frequent LUS
abnormalities were score 1 findings (bilateral vertical “B-kerley”
lines) in 38 patients (82.6%) followed by score 2 findings (thickened
and irregular pleural line) in 5 patients (10.9%). The most frequent
laboratory abnormalities were lymphocytopenia, elevated levels of
C-reactive protein, creatine kinase, lactate dehydrogenase and D-Dimer.
Treatment during hospital admission is shown in Table 3 . All
patients received oxygen (using Venturi mask or nasal cannula) and one
third required high oxygen concentrations (higher than 50%). One third
of patients received only symptomatic treatment and the remaining 69%
received medical treatment, the most frequent being the combination of
hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin in 66 cases. No medication-related
adverse event was observed.
During hospitalization, 26 patients (26%) died and 10 (10%) were
transferred to the ICU. The outcome in the UCI was as follows: 4
patients died and 6 were discharged at home. After a median length of
stay of 7 days, the remaining 64 patients (64%) were discharged at home
with no readmissions.