Data analysis
Demographics and clinical variables are reported with descriptive
analysis in the overall population and according to the outcome of
hospital mortality. In particular, categorical data were reported as
numbers and percentages; median with interquartile range [IQR] is
used to report continuous data as most of them were not normally
distributed according to Kolgomorov-Smirnoff test and/or Q-Q plot
inspection. Missing values were not included in the analyses. Data
imputation was not carried out due to the presence of data missing not
at random.
Categorical variables were analyzed using Fisher’s exact test.
Continuous variables were analyzed with Mann-Whitney tests. Due to the
small sample size, no multivariate analysis or regression were conducted
to correct for confounders. All statistical tests were two-sided and
were performed using the SPSS software (IBM SPSS
Statistics® for Windows, Version 25.0. Armonk, NY: IBM
Corp. ).