TY - JOUR AU - Zinellu, Angelo AU - De Vito, Andrea AU - Scano, Valentina AU - Paliogiannis, Panagiotis AU - Fiore, Vito AU - Madeddu, Giordano AU - Maida, Ivana AU - Zinellu, Elisabetta AU - Mangoni, Arduino Aleksander AU - Arru, Luigi Benedetto AU - Carru, Ciriaco AU - Babudieri, Sergio AU - Pirina, Pietro AU - Fois, Alessandro Giuseppe PY - 2021/03/31 Y2 - 2024/03/28 TI - The PaO2/FiO2 ratio on admission is independently associated with prolonged hospitalization in COVID-19 patients JF - The Journal of Infection in Developing Countries JA - J Infect Dev Ctries VL - 15 IS - 03 SE - Coronavirus Pandemic DO - 10.3855/jidc.13288 UR - https://jidc.org/index.php/journal/article/view/33839709 SP - 353-359 AB - <p>Introduction: The early identification of factors that predict the length of hospital stay (HS) in patients affected by coronavirus desease (COVID-19) might assist therapeutic decisions and patient flow management.</p><p>Methodology: We collected, at the time of admission, routine clinical, laboratory, and imaging parameters of hypoxia, lung damage, inflammation, and organ dysfunction in a consecutive series of 50 COVID-19 patients admitted to the Respiratory Disease and Infectious Disease Units of the University Hospital of Sassari (North-Sardinia, Italy) and alive on discharge.</p><p>Results: Prolonged HS (PHS, &gt;21 days) patients had significantly lower PaO<sub>2</sub>/FiO<sub>2</sub> ratio and lymphocytes, and significantly higher Chest CT severity score, C-reactive protein (CRP) and lactic dehydrogenase (LDH) when compared to non-PHS patients. In univariate logistic regression, Chest CT severity score (OR = 1.1891, <em>p</em> = 0.007), intensity of care (OR = 2.1350, <em>p</em> = 0.022), PaO<sub>2</sub>/FiO<sub>2</sub> ratio (OR = 0.9802, <em>p</em> = 0.007), CRP (OR = 1.0952, <em>p</em> = 0.042) and platelet to lymphocyte ratio (OR = 1.0039, <em>p</em> = 0.036) were significantly associated with PHS. However, in multivariate logistic regression, only the PaO<sub>2</sub>/FiO<sub>2</sub> ratio remained significantly correlated with PHS (OR = 0.9164; 95% CI 0.8479-0.9904, <em>p</em> = 0.0275). In ROC curve analysis, using a threshold of 248, the PaO2/FiO2 ratio predicted PHS with sensitivity and specificity of 60% and 91%, respectively (AUC = 0.780, 95% CI 0.637-0.886 <em>p</em> = 0.002).</p><p>Conclusions: The PaO<sub>2</sub>/FiO<sub>2</sub> ratio on admission is independently associated with PHS in COVID-19 patients. Larger prospective studies are needed to confirm this finding.</p> ER -