Demographic and Clinical Characteristics of COVID-19 Patients

Abstract

Objective: The COVID-19 disease, which first appeared in Wuhan, China, at the end of 2019, soon affected the whole world. This study aims to examine the relationship between the demographic characteristics and clinical symptoms of COVID-19 patients and mortality rates during the COVID-19 pandemic period. Material and Methods: This retrospective observational study was done on the files of 671 dead or living patients with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 pneumonia hospitalized in Sinop State Hospital in Turkey from February to September of 2020. The demographic features such as sex, age, and comorbidities such as diabetes, hypertension, etc., and clinical symptoms of the disease such as fever, cough, shortness of breath, respiratory distress, weakness, head rotation, etc., were recorded. Results: The total mean age of the patients was 56.08 years. The most common symptoms were cough, fever, respiratory distress, shortness of breath, and the most common comorbidities were hypertension, diabetes, ischemic heart disease, and COPD. There was a statistically significant difference between the dead and living patients in terms of sex (p=0.011, EXP(B)=0.429), cough (p=0.000, EXP(B)=0.137), and respiratory illness (p=0.000, EXP(B)= 15.526). There was a statistically significant difference between the dead and living patients in terms of age, number of additional illness, number of arrival complaint, length of stay in the hospital, intensive care hospitalization period, and number of medications used (p-values=0.000, 0.040, 0.000, 0.020, 0.030, and 0.000, respectively). Conclusion: As a result of our study, gender, cough, and respiratory tract disease were statistically effective factors for course of illness. In addition, there was a significant difference between living and deceased patients in terms of age, number of additional diseases, number of admission complaints, length of hospital stay, length of stay in the intensive care unit, and number of drugs used. According to these results, it has been concluded that COVID-19 patients with these factors should be followed more carefully.