• Wandong Hong, Qin Chen, Songzan Qian, Zarrin Basharat, Vincent Zimmer, Yumin Wang, Maddalena Zippi, and Jingye Pan.
• Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou, China.
• Front Cell Infect Microbiol. 2021 Jan 1; 11: 550456.

ObjectivesThe objective of this study was to investigate the clinical features and laboratory findings of patients with and without critical COVID-19 pneumonia and identify predictors for the critical form of the disease.MethodsDemographic, clinical, and laboratory data of 63 COVID-19 pneumonia patients were retrospectively reviewed. Laboratory parameters were also collected within 3-5 days, 7-9 days, and 11-14 days of hospitalization. Outcomes were followed up until March 12, 2020.ResultsTwenty-two patients developed critically ill pneumonia; one of them died. Upon admission, older patients with critical illness were more likely to report cough and dyspnoea with higher respiration rates and had a greater possibility of abnormal laboratory parameters than patients without critical illness. When compared with the non-critically ill patients, patients with serious illness had a lower discharge rate and longer hospital stays, with a trend towards higher mortality. The interleukin-6 level in patients upon hospital admission was important in predicting disease severity and was associated with the length of hospitalization.ConclusionsMany differences in clinical features and laboratory findings were observed between patients exhibiting non-critically ill and critically ill COVID-19 pneumonia. Non-critically ill COVID-19 pneumonia also needs aggressive treatments. Interleukin-6 was a superior predictor of disease severity.Copyright © 2021 Hong, Chen, Qian, Basharat, Zimmer, Wang, Zippi and Pan.

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