Laboratory Examinations of Employees of Muhammadiyah University General Hospital of Malang Infected With COVID-19

Abstract

COVID-19 can symptomatically and asymptomatically affect patients. Asymptomatic cases have become a particular concern for public health in the COVID-19 pandemic. One of the simple tests for COVID-19 is the complete blood count that can predict systemic inflammation and disease severity. The description of laboratory tests in asymptomatic COVID-19 patients is rarely reported. This study aimed to compare the laboratory test results of both symptomatic and asymptomatic COVID-19 employees of the Muhammadiyah University General Hospital of Malang. Data were taken from medical records. Diagnoses of COVID-19 were confirmed by nasopharynx-oropharynx PCR swab. Patient characteristics included age, gender, and values of hemoglobin, leukocytes, neutrophils, lymphocytes, platelets, NLR and CRP from two different groups: symptomatic and asymptomatic infected employees. There were 104 COVID-19 infected employees at the hospital from April 2020 to February 2021. Female infected employees (52.9%) were more numerous male infected employees. Employees aged 21-30 years accounted for 53.84% of the total cases. The numbers of symptomatic and asymptomatic employees were 10 employees (9.6%) and 94 employees (90.4%), respectively. There was a significant difference between the symptomatic and asymptomatic groups in the numbers of lymphocytes (p = 0.03) and CRP (p = 0.046). There were no significant differences in the other laboratory results. Lymphopenia and increased CRP numbers more often occurred in the symptomatic group compared to the asymptomatic group. Therefore, these parameters can be an indicator for predicting disease severity. However, further research is needed with a bigger sample.
 Keywords: COVID-19, symptomatic, asymptomatic, Muhammadiyah University General Hospital of Malang