Javeid Iqbal, Aijaz Zeeshan Khan Chachar, Aneela Chaudhary, Asma Afzal Khan, Asma Kazi, Arzinda Fatima, Saima Chaudhary.
Clinical and Biochemical Profile of patients with COVID - 19 Infection; a Multicenter-Retrospective study from three Tertiary Care Hospitals of Lahore, Pakistan.
J Pak Society Int Med Jan ;2(1):42-6.

Objectives: To assess the clinical and biochemical profile of patients with Covid - 19 infection in three major tertiary care hospitals of Lahore, Pakistan. Methods: Retrospective observational study involving three tertiary care hospitals of Lahore. Fatima Memorial Hospital, Services Hospital and Jinnah Hospital, Lahore. Sample Size: Total 100 patients; Study duration: 2 months, 15th October to 15th December, 2020. Results:Atotal of 100 patients hospitalized with Covid-19 infection were observed in this retrospective study. The commonest symptoms observed were fever, shortness of breath and cough with 80.4%, 63.0% and 57.6% percentages respectively. Diabetes was the most prevalent pre-existing condition with 29% men and 21% women known to have the disease. Although, many more male patients required oxygen n= 47 than female patients n = 26, the p-value wasn't significant (p-value = 1.000). Our observational study also demonstrated lymphopenia in both gender groups with median lymphocyte count being 14. The total neutrophil count was a median =77 with IQR = 22.0. The neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio was 5.85 (median). We observed higher levels of inflammatory markers in men as compared to women. Median CRP of 74 versus 27.28 in men and women respectively. Median serum ferritin of 635.93 in men compared to median of 361.00 in women. Both values correspond to increased disease severity in men. We observed a total d-dimer median of 1.13 (IQR 3.24) with no difference between our gender groups (p-value = 0.797). We observed patients Troponin I was recorded as median of 5.90 in male patients compared with median of 3.60 in female patients. Our cohort of patients demonstrated a median serum creatinine of 0.99 (IQR = 0.51). Conclusion: Patients with multiple co-morbidities and having high Neutrophil to lymphocyte ratio, increased inflammatory markers and raised markers of organ dysfunction are at increased risk of developing severe disease with gender variation too as males are more prone to develop severe infection.

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