Association between D-dimer and mortality in COVID-19 patients: a single center study from a Turkish hospital

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: Early and effective laboratory parameters are required to determine the prognosis of COVID-19. In this study, our aim was to investigate the relationship between the D-dimer levels of patients with COVID-19 and their in-hospital mortality status. MATERIAL AND METHODS: This retrospective observational study was conducted with patients diagnosed with COVID-19 in the emergency department of a tertiary hospital between January 1, 2022, and June 1, 2022. Patients with a negative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction test result and those with unavailable D-dimer records were not included in the study. RESULTS: The population of this study consisted of 517 patients, 241 women and 276 men. The mean age of the patients was 72.4 years. The patients were divided into two groups as survivors and non-survivors. There were 320 patients in the survivor group and 197 in the non-survivor group. As a result of the statistical analysis, D-dimer was found to be statistically significant in predicting in-hospital mortality in patients with COVID-19 (p < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: In this study, it was concluded that COVID-19 cases with high D-dimer levels had a higher in-hospital mortality rate. In addition, it was observed that patients admitted to the intensive care unit had higher D-dimer levels than those that did not require intensive care.