CLINICAL CHARACTERISTICS, RISK FACTORS FOR SEVERITY AND OUTCOMES OF CORONAVIRUS 2019 ADULT PATIENTS ADMITTED TO HIWOT FANA SPECIALIZED UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL, CORONAVIRUS 2019 TREATMENT CENTER, EASTERN ETHIOPIA, HARAR: A_HOSPITAL BASED CROSS-SECTIONAL STUDY

Abstract

During the outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019, a considerable difference in clinical characteristics, disease severity and outcomes observed among patients treated in different centers. But there is no study done in Hiwot Fana specialized university Hospital, xii Eastern Ethiopia that assessed the clinical characteristics, risk factors for disease severity and outcomes of Coronavirus 2019 admitted adult patients. Objective: The study aimed to assess the clinical characteristics, risk factors for severity and outcomes of Coronavirus 2019 adult patients admitted to Hiwot Fana specialized University Hospital Methods: A hospital-based cross-sectional study was conducted from November to December 2021 on randomly selected sample of 402 Coronavirus 2019 adult patients admitted to Hiwot Fana hospital. Data about sociodemographic, clinical characteristics, laboratory, treatment and outcomes were collected by reviewing medical record of patients. The data was tabulated, cleaned and entered in to Epidata version 3.2 and exported to SPSS version 22 for analysis. Discrete variables were summarized by percentages and frequencies whereas continuous variables were summarized by medians and 25th and 75th quartile. The statistical inference was done using t-test and Pearson’s Chi square for continuous and categorical variables respectively. Statistical significance was measured by p-values < 0.05 and adjusted odds ratio with 95% confidence interval. Both ordinal and binary logistic regression was done to determine independent risk factors for severity and predictors outcome. Results: In this retrospective cross-sectional study of 402 admitted COVID-19 adult patients with median age of 46 years, male accounts for 60.8%. comorbidity was present in 55.2% of patients, the most common being hypertension (32.6%), diabetes (25.9%), cardiac (16.9%), asthma (5.5%), HIV and COPD in 5% each. Among 402 patients 83.8% were symptomatic at presentation, the most common symptoms were fatigue (73%), cough (69.1%), fever (67 %), headache (54.9%) and Shortness of breath (51.9%). The spectrum of disease severity is asymptomatic 65(16.2), non-severe 111(27.5%) severe 124(30.8%), and critical 102(25.4%). overall, 19.2% died. Older age, hypertension, DM, tachypnea, presence of shortness of breath and chest pain, lower oxygen saturation, lymphopenia and higher creatinine were independent predictors of disease severity and outcome. Conclusion: The study showed that proportion of patients with severe and critical disease and mortality rate is high; older age, comorbidity, shortness of breath, chest pain, admission respiratory rate and oxygen saturation, lymphopenia and elevated creatinine are independent predictors of severity and outcome